Bro. Briggs then handed me a pencil and asked Bro. Smith if he ever saw the plates his brother had had, from which the Book of Mormon was translated.

He replied, "I did not see them uncovered but I handled them and hefted them while wrapped in a tow frock and judged them to have weighed about sixty pounds. I could tell they were places of some kind and that they were fastened together by rings running through the back. Their size was as described in mother's history."