[9] Abbott, C. C. Annual Report of the Curator of the Museum of American Archeology, University of Pennsylvania. No. 1, p. 7.
The entire simplicity of the archeologic conditions in the Delaware valley may be further illustrated. Had William Penn paused in his arduous traffic with the tawny Delawares, and glanced out with far-sighted eyes from beneath the pendant branches of the great elm at Shackamaxon, he might have beheld an uncouth savage laboriously fabricating rude ice age tools, making the clumsy turtle-back, shaping the mysterious paleolith, thus taking that first and most interesting theoretical step in human art and history. Had he looked again a few moments later he might have beheld the same tawny individual deeply absorbed in the task of trimming a long rude spear point of "Eskimo" type from the refractory argillite. If he had again paused when another handful of baubles had been judiciously exchanged, he would have seen the familiar redskin carefully finishing his arrow points and fitting them to their shafts preparatory to a hunting and fishing cruise on the placid Delaware. Thus in a brief space of time Penn might have gleaned the story of the ages—the history of the turtle-back, the long spear point and their allies—as in a single sheaf. But the opportunity was wasted, and the heaps of flinty refuse left upon the river bank by the workmen were the only record left of the nature of the work of that day. Two hundred years of aboriginal misfortune and Quaker inattention and neglect have resulted in so mixing up the simple evidence of a day's work, that it has taken twenty-five years to collect the scattered fragments, to sift, separate and classify them, and to assign them to theoretic places in a scheme of culture evolution that spans ten thousand years.
Yet is there really nothing in it all, in the theories, the observations, the collections and the books? Do I speak too positively in condemnation of the results of years of earnest investigation? Perhaps so, but the voluminous testimony is so overloaded with inaccuracies, the relics of unscientific method and misleading hypotheses, that every item must be sharply questioned; and the conclusions reached so far overstep the limits warranted by the evidence, that heroic measures alone can be effectual in determining their exact value. If, as many believe, vital errors have been embodied in the evidence presented by the advocates of the theory, it is impossible to state the case too strongly. Error once fully absorbed into the literature of science has many advantages over the tardy truth; it is strongly fortified and must be attacked and exposed without fear or favor. Truth involved with it cannot permanently suffer. If the twin theories of a gravel and a paleolithic man in eastern America are to be assailed as unsound or as not properly supported, it should be done now while the originators and upholders are alive and alert to sustain their positions or to yield to the advances of truth. I do not wish to wrongly characterize or to unduly minimize the evidence brought to bear in favor of these theories. I do intend, however, to assist the world so far as possible in securing an exact estimate of all that has been said and done, and all that is to be done.
In a previous article I have examined the evidence relating to paleolithic art in the eastern United States, and have indicated its utter inadequacy and unreliability. In this paper the testimony relating to the occurrence of gravel art, in the locality most fully relied upon by advocates of the theory, has been partially reviewed and subjected to the strong light of recent observations. It is found that the whole fabric, so imposing in books and museums, shrinks away surprisingly as it is approached. The evidence furnished by the bluff face and by the railway cutting, the two leading sites, is fatally weakened by the practical demonstration of the fact that the gravels proper are at these points barren of art remains. In endeavoring to naturalize an immigrant hypothesis, our gravel searchers, unacquainted with the true nature of the objects collected and discussed, and little skilled in the observation of the phenomena by means of which all questions of age must be determined, have undoubtedly made grievous mistakes and have thus misled an expectant and credulous public.
The articles themselves, the so-called gravel finds, when closely studied are found to tell their own story much more fully and accurately than it has heretofore been read by students of archeology. This story is that the art of the Delaware valley is to all intents and purposes a unit, that there is nothing unique or especially primitive or ancient and nothing un-Indian in it all. All forms are found on demonstrably recent sites of manufacture. The rude forms assigned by some to glacial times are all apparently "wasters" of Indian manufacture. The large blades of "Eskimo" type are only the larger blades, knives and spear points of the Indian, separated arbitrarily from the body of the art-remains to subserve the ends of a theory, certain obscure phenomena of occurrence having been found to give color to the proceeding. To place any part of this art, rude or elaborate, permanently in any other than the ordinary Indian category will take stronger proofs than have yet been developed in the region itself.
The question asked in the beginning, "Are there traces of glacial man in the Trenton gravels?" if not answered decisively in the negative, stands little chance, considering present evidence, of being answered in the affirmative. In view of the fact that numerous observations of apparent value have been made in other sections, there is yet sufficient reason for letting the query stand, and we may continue to cherish the hope that possibly by renewed effort and improved methods of investigation, something may yet be found in the Trenton gravels clearly demonstrative of the fascinating belief in a great antiquity for the human race in America.
The evidence upon which paleolithic man in America depends is so intangible that, unsupported by supposed analogies with European conditions and phenomena, and by the suggestions of an ideal scheme of culture progress, it would vanish in thin air; and if the theory of a glacial man can summon to its aid no better testimony than that furnished by the examples examined in this paper, the whole scheme, so elaborately mounted and so confidently proclaimed, is in imminent danger of early collapse.
W. H. Holmes.