328 HAMMERS. LANCE-HEADS. 



Awls and saws are very much less frequent, but some few 

 good specimens have been found. At some of the stations, 

 curious flat implements (fig. 181) are met with. From the 



FIG. 181. 



Flint Implement. 



constancy of their form, which, moreover, is somewhat pecu- 

 liar, we may safely infer that they were applied to some 

 definite purpose. For hammers, the reindeer hunters seem 

 to have used round stones, a good many of which occur in the 

 caves, and which bear unmistakable marks of the purpose to 

 which they were applied. Some of them, however, may have 

 served also as heaters. The North American Indians, the 

 Esquimaux, and some other savages, having no pottery, but 

 only wooden vessels, which could not be put on the fire, used 

 to heat stones, and then place them in the water which they 

 wished to boil. Many of the stones found in these caverns 

 appear to have been used in this manner. 



These, the commonest sorts of flint implements, are found 

 indiscriminately in all the grottos, but there are some other 

 types which appear to be less generally distributed. Thus, 

 at Laugerie and Badegoule, fragments of leaf-shaped lance- 

 heads, almost as well worked as some of those from Denmark, 

 are far from uncommon. If, therefore, we were to attempt 

 any classification of the grottos, according to the periods of 

 their occupation, we might be disposed to refer these to a 

 somewhat later period than most of the others. On the con- 

 trary, to judge from the flint implements, the station at Le 



