372 AUSTRALIAN ABORIGINAL. STONE WEAPONS AND IMPLEMENTS. 



their bodies, were black, white, red, and yellow. These colours 

 were usually derived from the decomposition of certain rocks 

 resulting in the formation of clays. Yellow, red, and white were 

 generally used for painting the person, and the two latter colours 

 for weapons, although the first was employed at times, especially 

 according to Smyth, throughout Northern Australia. 



Mr. Froggatt has brought both red and yellow colour-stones 

 from the Lennard River, taken from the dilly-bags of the Abor- 

 igines. The former consists of a highly ferruginous blood-red 

 gritty rock, which, from the rounded condition of its edges, shows 

 that it has undergone a good deal of friction, and in its present 

 shape and condition resembles a piece of french-chalk, as used by 

 clothiers for marking cloth. The latter is simply a small semi- 

 decomposed ironstone nodule, the concentric layers still showing 

 on a fractured surface. The edges of this specimen have all the 

 appearance of having been cut with some sharp instrument. 



EXPLANATION OF PLATES. 



Fig. 13. — Chip used by Marathon blacks for carving wooden implements. 

 Coll. Sweet, Melbourne ; Mining and Geol. Mus. Nat. size. 



Fig, 14. — Undescribed form of Stone Axe, formed of a flesh-coloured 

 quartzite, and mounded in a withy wound round it ; North 

 Central Queensland. ? Coll. Australian Mus. Little less 

 than half nat size. 



Fig. 15. — Head of Tomahawk of black basalt ; Lennard River, Kimberley. 

 Coll. Froggatt. Slightly reduced. 



