Fig. 6.
There is, however, another somewhat different class of North American flint articles, which, as I believe, were employed by the aborigines for scraping and smoothing wood, horn, and other materials in which they worked, or perhaps, also, in the preparation of skins. They resemble stemmed arrow-heads, which, instead of being pointed, terminate in a semi-lunar, regularly chipped edge. It is probable that they were partly made from arrow-heads which had lost their points. Schoolcraft gives in Fig. 3, of Plate 18, in the first volume of his large work, the drawing of an object of this class, calling it "the blunt arrow or Beekwuk, (Algonkin,) which was fired at a mark." It is likely enough that these articles served in part the purpose assigned to them by Mr. Schoolcraft. Yet, I have in my collection several in which the rounded edge is worn and polished, while the remaining part retains its original sharpness of fracture, a circumstance that can only be ascribed to continued use, and therefore leads me to believe that they were employed in the manner already indicated. These implements hardly could be used without handles. Fig. 5 represents, in natural size, one of my specimens, which was found on the surface near West Belleville, Saint Clair County, Illinois. The material is a yellowish-brown flint. The edge, it will be seen, is perfectly scraper-like. Inserted into a stout handle, this object would make an excellent scraper. The edge of this specimen is not polished, but it seems as if small particles of the edge had been scaled off by the pressure exerted in the use of the implement. In the original of the above full-size representation, Fig. 6, on the contrary, the curved edge is rubbed off to a considerable extent and perfectly polished, while the portion opposite the edge bears not the slightest trace of friction. This specimen, which consists of a whitish flint, was found in Saint Clair County, Illinois. In Fig. 7, lastly, I represent, in natural size, a fine large specimen, which I class among the implements under notice. I formerly supposed it to be a tool destined for cutting purposes, but the condition of the edge, which is rather blunt and hardly fit for cutting, afterward induced me to change my opinion. Originally, perhaps, one of those unusually large spear-heads, which are occasionally found, it may have been reduced subsequently, after having lost the point, to its present shape. Yet, it may never have possessed a form different from that which it now exhibits. This specimen is chipped from a fine reddish flint which contains encrinites. I obtained it from quarrymen near West Belleville, who found it in the earth while they were engaged in baring the rock for extending the quarry. In conclusion, I will state that, since writing the preceding pages, I received a number of stone implements from Muncy, Lycoming County, Pennsylvania, among which there are some large scrapers of the European type. Their material, however, is not flint, but either graywacke or a kind of tough slate.
Fig. 7.
FOOTNOTES:
[1] Koch, in Transactions of the Academy of Science of Saint Louis, vol. i, (1860,) p. 61, &c.
[2] I am well aware that the reality of Dr. Koch's discovery has been doubted by some, although it is difficult to perceive why he should have made those statements, if not true, at a time when the antiquity of man was not yet discussed, either in Europe or here, and he, therefore, could expect nothing but contradiction, public opinion being totally unprepared for such revelations. Not being a scientific palaeontologist, he certainly made some mistakes in putting together the bones of the animals exhumed by him; but these failings, in my opinion, have no bearing on his observations relative to the co-existence of man with extinct animals in North America. Only a short time ago some remarks tending to depreciate Dr. Koch's account were made by Dr. Schmidt, in an article on the antiquity of man in America, published in vol. v, of the Archiv für Anthropologie. I may state here that I was personally acquainted with Dr. Koch, whom I saw repeatedly at the meetings of the Academy of Science of Saint Louis.
[3] Prehistoric Times, 1st ed., p. 236.