About eight miles southeast of Newark there was formerly a large mound composed of masses of free stone, which had been brought from some distance and thrown into a heap without much placing or care. In early days, stone being scarce in that region, the settlers carried away the mound piece by piece to use for building purposes, so that in a few years there was little more than a large flattened heap of rubbish remaining. Some fifteen years ago, the county surveyor (I have forgotten his name), who had for some time been searching ancient works, turned his attention to this particular pile. He employed a number of men and proceeded at once to open it. Before long he was rewarded by finding in the centre and near the surface a bed of the tough clay generally known as pipe-clay, which must have been brought from a distance of some twelve miles. Imbedded in the clay was a coffin, dug out of a burr-oak log, and in a pretty good state of preservation. In the coffin was a skeleton, with quite a number of stone ornaments and emblems, and some open brass rings, suitable for bracelets or anklets. These being removed, they dug down deeper, and soon discovered a stone dressed to an oblong shape, about eighteen inches long and twelve wide, which proved to be a casket, neatly fitted and completely water-tight, containing a slab of stone of hard and fine quality, and an inch and a half thick, eight inches long, four inches wide at one end, and tapering to three inches at the other. Upon the face of the slab was the figure of a man, apparently a priest with a long flowing beard, and a robe reaching to his feet. Over his head was a curved line of characters, and upon the edges and back of the stone closely and neatly carved letters. The slab, which I saw myself, was shown to the Episcopalian clergyman of Newark, and he pronounced the writings to be the Ten Commandments in ancient Hebrew. [7]