Northern Wisconsin advertiser. [volume] (Wabeno, Wis.) 1898-1925, 1903-08-06

stance Of its being on alluvial ground
and the other mounds scattered
around it we could hardly believe it
the work of human hands. The
shape is that of a paralellogram,
standing from north to south; on the
south side there is broad apron or
! step about halfway down, and from
this another projection into the plain
about fifteen feet wide, which was
| probably intended as an ascent TO the
mound. BY stepping around the base
computed the circumference to be at
least 500 yards and the height Of the
mound about ninety feet. The step or
apron has been used as a kitchen gar
den by the monks of La Trappe
settled near this and the top is sowed
with wheat" This early visitor con-
cluded, after an examination of the
other smaller mounds that very
populous town had once existed there,
similar to those of Mexico, described
by the first conquerors. The mounds
were sites of temples or monuments to
great men"
Monks Credited With the Work.
Another later writer referring to
Cahokia, has said: 1T is probable that
upon this platform was reared a
capacious temple. within whose walls
the high priests, gathered from diff
ferent quarters at stated seasons. cele-
brated their mystic rites, while the
Iswarming mutitudes below looked up
in mute alteration" Modern archae-
lology discredits the "capaclous
temple" although ii accepts the prob
liability of swarming multitudes and the
likelihood that one of the largest
Ihumanmade piles of earth in the world
had religious purpose. Mr.. Bushnell
is Of this opinion basing his belief
upon the fact that the largest
structures raised by humanity have
almost invariably proved to have a
religious significance.
The age and actual purpose of the
Cahokia mound are questions which
will perhaps never he definitely an
lswered, although for all that is known
ly awaiting the moment when the
mound is carefully tunneled and its
contents investigated. Like that of
ether relics of the mound builders,
its age was once thought to be I'M
doubtedly several thousand years.
According to this belief it might have
annotated the ruins that have been
Ia -,
theory has even been put forward that
would carry it back TO the mythical
days of Atlantis, when a great con,
vulsion Of nature was supposed to
have destroyed communication be-
tween the eastern and western con-
tinents, before that time united in a
single body of land. Modern ar
chaeology has very much reduced,
without absolutely disproving. the
likelihood of this remote antiquity,
and the evidence so far gathered from
the almost countless ruins that dot the
valley OF the Mississippi and its
tributaries disproves also the earlier
belief that the race which made them
must have been materially different
from the Indian tribes who afterward
inherited them.
Not the Work Of Indians.
/ The absence of Indian tradition cen
cerning the mound builders is, for ex.
: ample, no longer taken as proof OF
t anything more than comparative
+ antiquity, for a study of the Indians
= has shown that a few hundred years
would have suffced as readily as few
| thousand TO quite conceal the origin
5 even OF so remarkable a mound as the
: great Cahokla
, The habits Of the modern Indian, as
: he was found IN different parts OF
} America, have likewise removed in the
/ light of modern comparative study the
} old idea that the mophd builders were
: an agricultural people. living in fixed
communities, while the Indians. on
, the other hand. were a series of roam
ing nations subsisting chiefly by the
chase. 1t has been proved that the
J Indians In many cases were quite as
much farmers as hunters; that they
cultivated broad fields of maize and
corn ana kept supplies of provisions
sufficient, as sometimes happened