So far as is known, up to the present time no burial-urns have been found in North America resembling those discovered in Nicaragua by Dr. J. C. Bransford, U.S.N., but it is quite within the range of possibility that future researches in regions not far distant from that which he explored may reveal similar treasures. Figure 6 represents different forms of burial-urns, _a_, _b_, and _e_, after Foster, are from Laporte, Ind. _f_, after Foster, is from Greenup County, Kentucky; _d_ is from Milledgeville, Ga., in Smithsonian collection, No. 27976; and _c_ is one of the peculiar shoe-shaped urns brought from Ometepec Island, Lake Nicaragua, by Surgeon J. C. Bransford, U.S.N. [Illustration: FIG. 6.--Burial Urns.] [Illustration: FIG. 7.--Indian Cemetery.] SURFACE BURIAL. This mode of interment was practiced to only a limited extent, so far as can be discovered, and it is quite probable that in most cases it was employed as a temporary expedient when the survivors were pressed for time. The Seminoles of Florida are said to have buried in hollow trees, the bodies being placed in an upright position, occasionally the dead being crammed into a hollow log lying on the ground. With some of the Eastern tribes a log was split in half and hollowed out sufficiently large to contain the corpse; it was then lashed together with withes and permitted to remain where it was originally placed. In some cases a pen was built over and around it. This statement is corroborated by R. S. Robertson, of Fort Wayne, Ind., who states, in a communication received in 1877, that the Miamis practiced surface burial in two different ways: * * * 1st. The surface burial in hollow logs. These have been found in heavy forests. Sometimes a tree has been split and the two halves hollowed out to receive the body, when it was either closed with withes or confined to the ground with crossed stakes; and sometimes a hollow tree is used by closing the ends. 2d. Surface burial where the body was covered by a small pen of logs laid up as we build a cabin, but drawing in every course until they meet in a single log at the top. The writer has recently received from Prof. C. Engelhardt, of Copenhagen, Denmark, a brochure describing the oak coffins of Borum-Æshœi. From an engraving in this volume it would appear that the manner employed by the ancient Danes of hollowing out logs for coffins has its analogy among the North American Indians. Romantically conceived, and carried out to the fullest possible extent in accordance with the _ante mortem_ wishes of the dead, were the obsequies of Blackbird, the great chief of the Omahas. The account is given by George Catlin:[40]