Book Description

Excerpt from Aboriginal Fishing Stations on the Coast of the Middle Atlantic States Heaps of discarded shells and kitchen refuse, in some instances of extraordinary size, indicate their locality. I venture to say that nowhere else on our eastern coast are there so many unmistakable evidences of a large aboriginal population. Where the settlements were not permanent, as were those on the Chesapeake and upper Delaware Bay, they were abandoned in winter and revisited with every recurring autumn. In selecting a site for this purpose adaptability was the first consideration. An elevation safe from inundating tides, a water course which gave easy communication with the open bay or sea, and proximity to fresh water and timber were the essentials. Here the natives sought the invigorating air of the sea and its attractive fisheries with an avidity which we of the present day have only followed. Those who composed these annual excursions were principally the nearby tribes, but that others from the interior participated, is shown by the discovery on our eastern coast of objects made from metal and bone that have an exclusive origin west of the Alleghanies; silent witnesses of an intercourse between widely separated tribal communities. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.