ward from the upper jaw to the crown, or otherwise this space is occupied by an elongated perforation. The body is represented as encircling the head in a single coil, which appears from beneath the neck on the right, passes around the front of the head, and terminates at the back in a pointed tail with well-defined rattles. It is engraved to represent the well-known scales and spots of the rattlesnake, the conventionalized figures being quite graphic.

Shell gorget with spider design from a mound in St. Clair county, Illinois.

The Spider.-Among insects the spider is best calculated to attract the attention of the savage. The curiously constructed houses of some varieties and the marvelous web of others must elicit the admiration of all beholders. It is certainly not strange that the spider appears in the myths of savages, yet it occurs but rarely in aboriginal art. Four examples engraved upon shell gorgets have come to my notice. The very fine specimen illustrated in Fig. 5 was obtained from a mound in St. Clair county, Illinois. It was found on the breast of a skeleton, and was very much discolored and quite fragile from decay; but no part of the design, which was engraved upon the concave side, has been obliterated. Near the margin and parallel with it three lines have been

engraved. The spider is drawn with considerable fidelity to nature, and covers nearly the entire disk-the legs, mandibles, and abdomen reaching the outer marginal line.

The thorax is placed in the center of the disk, and is represented by a circle, within which a cross has been engraved. The ends of the four arms have been enlarged on one side, producing a form much used in heraldry, but one very rarely met with in aboriginal American art. The head is somewhat heart-shaped, and is armed with palpi and mandibles, the latter being ornamented with a zigzag line and prolonged to the marginal lines of the disk. The eyes are represented by two small circles with central dots. The legs are correctly placed in four pairs upon the thorax, and are very graphically drawn. The abdomen is large and somewhat heart-shaped, and is ornamented with a number of lines and dots which represent the natural markings of the spider. The perforations for suspension are placed near the posterior extremity of the abdomen.

A gorget having a similar design was obtained from a mound on Fain's Island, Tennessee. The insect has been somewhat more highly conventionalized, but the general effect is very similar to that of the Illinois specimens.*

The Human Face.-A very important group of shell ornaments represent the human face more or less distinctly. By a combination of engraving and sculpture a rude resemblance to the features is produced. These objects are generally made from pear-shaped sections of the lower whorl of large marine univalves. The lower portion, which represents the neck and chin, is cut from the somewhat restricted part near the base of the shell; while the broad outline of the head reaches the first suture or the noded shoulder of the body whorl. The features are carved upon the convex surface. In the simpler forms the nose is represented by a low vertical ridge, no other features being indicated. Others have rings or perforations for eyes and rude indentations for the mouth, while the more elaborate examples have a variety of lines cut upon the cheeks or chin.

Fig. 6 represents a specimen from the Brakebill Mound, East Tennessee. The mouth is not indicated and the nose is but slightly

Detailed descriptions of these objects will be given in the Second Annual Report of the Bureau of Ethnology.

relieved. Each eye, however, is inclosed by a figure which extends downward over the cheek, terminating in three sharp points.

Fig. 7 represents a fine example of these objects said to have been obtained on Acquia Creek, Va. It is unusally well preserved and is five and one-half inches in length by five in width. The outline is somewhat rectangular, the upper margin being pretty well rounded, and ornamented with a corona of incised lines, which are arranged in six groups of four each. Inside of these a single incised line runs parallel with the edge from temple to temple. The eyes are represented by circles with small central pits, and the lids, by long, pointed ellipses. From each of the eyes a group of three zigzag lines extends downward over the cheek, terminating near the edge of the plate opposite the mouth. The nose is represented by a flat ridge, which terminates abruptly below, the nostrils being indicated by two small excavations. In regard to the peculiar lines engraved upon these faces, I would suggest that, if they are burial masks, the zigzag lines from the eyes may stand for tears, but I incline to the opinion rather that they are delineations of the tattooing or painting of the clan to which the deceased belonged. It is probable that these objects were further

embellished by painted designs.

These gorgets are especially numerous in the mounds of Tennessee, but their range is quite wide, examples having been reported from Kentucky, Virginia, Illinois, Missouri and Arkansas, and smaller ones of somewhat different types from New York and Louisiana. In size they range from two to ten inches in length, the width being considerably less. They are generally found associated with human remains in such a way as to suggest their use as ornaments for the head or neck. There are, however, no holes for suspension, except those made to represent the eyes; and these, so far as I have observed, show no abrasion by a cord of suspension.

The Human Figure -I now come to a class of relics which are new and unique, and in more than one respect are the most important objects of aboriginal art yet found within the limits of the United States. Of these I shall describe four which come from that part of the mound-building district occupied at one time by the "stone-grave" peoples-three from Tennessee and one from Missouri. Similar designs are not found on other materials, and, indeed, nothing at all resembling them exists, so far as I know, either in stone or in clay. If such were painted or engraved on less enduring materials they are totally destroyed.

Fig. 8 represents a gorget on which is engraved a rather rude delineation of a human figure. The design occupies the concave side of a large shell disk cut from a Busycon perversum. Near the upper margin are the usual holes for suspension. The engraved

FIG. 8.

Shell gorget with rude human figure, from a mound at Sevierville, Tennessee. design fills the central portion of the plate, and is inclosed by two approximately parallel lines, between which and the edge of the shell there is an annular space three-fourths of an inch wide. A casual observer would probably not recognize any design whatever in the jumble of half obliterated lines that occupies the inclosed space. It will first be noticed that a column about three-fourths of an inch in width stands erect in the center of the picture. From this spring a number of lines forming serpentine arms, which give the figure as much the appearance of an octopus crowded into a collector's alcohol jar as of a human creature. A little study will enable one, however, to recognize in the central column the human body, and in the tangle of lines surrounding it, the arms, legs, hands, feet, and their appendages-no line within the border being without its office. The upper extremity of the body is occupied by a circle one-eighth of an inch in diameter, which represents the eye. The head is not distinguished from the body by any sort of constriction for the neck, but has evidently been