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AMERICAN PORTAGES

enthusiasm on the part of the present writer, but he is strongly of the opinion that our historical societies are losing an invaluable amount of information and data by not seizing the advantage of the advice of pioneers' sons who are now living concerning the location of historic sites; not a little money is being expended here and there on archæological research which would produce exactly as fruitful returns a generation from now as it does today. The stone pipes and hammers will be found in as good condition in 1925 as 1903 but there are a hundred important sites that can never be marked correctly after a score of men now over seventy years of age have passed away. At a recent centennial celebration on the site of one of the most important forts in the entire West the old fortress was reconstructed with life-like accuracy under scholarly direction. It was necessary, however, because of inundations of the neighboring river, to draw in one of the bastions. It will not be many years before the entire topography of that site will be altered by the same destructive force, unless it is stayed, and when the