264 ETHNOLOGY. 



been much battered, is still moderately well preserved. This double-faced 

 condition of the backs of small axes is not unfrequent among the grooved 

 cobble-stone specimens. 



Localities known to have been the former sites of Indian villages are 

 ■Q'here these celts are now found in greatest abundance; a fact which 

 doe^ not hold good with reference to the grooved stone axes; although 

 these, too, have been found in "deposits" occasionally, as described in 

 Chapter III. In the instance referred to in the preceding chapter, of a 

 depiisit of fifty polished j)orphyry celts, we have possibly an indication 

 that the use of these implements was of a domestic and not warlike 

 character, supposing that the specimens were buried for the purpose 

 of concealing them from an enemy, should a sudden raid be made upon 

 the village. If such celts were weapons, they would always be in 

 demand, but as domestic implements, there might be times of consider- 

 able duration when they would not be required. If so, what method 

 more natural than to bury them ? The fact that undoubted weapons 

 are also found buried in considerable numbers does not, we think, mili- 

 tate against this supposition, since, in the burial of weapons, the deposits 

 were made by the makers of such specimens, and were usually in sub- 

 terranean arsenals ; the specimens being generally in an unfinished state. 



Chapter Y. 

 flint hatchets. 



We have seen that all the specimens as yet described under the head of 

 axes and celts have been, without exception, pebbles or " cobble-stones," 

 worn into shape by polishiug-stones ot peclced by a stone hammer into the 

 required form. We have nowhere made any allusion to a chipped ax. 

 The term " chipped " was puri)osely reserved, as it were, for flint-like 

 Stone-cutting implements, which we further i)ropose to designate as 

 hatchets, to distinguish them from "axes" proper; that is, pecl-ed or 

 l)olished pebble implements. The distinction between the two is, that 

 an ax has a j)olisbed edge, and a hatchet a chipped edge. 



Flint hatchets (which in New Jersey are never true flint) are found 

 associated with other implements, as arrow-points and spear-hcads, in 

 very scanty numbers, if we consider the very hatchet-like specimens only 

 as really the implement in question, and consider those as "implements" 

 having no particular use in view, or as rude spear-heads that do not 

 present the ideal outline of the hatchet in every detail. If we chance, 

 however, upon the site of an Indian village, or if, along the river or 

 creek bank, we come upon a mussel-shell heap or fresh-water KjiJl-l-en- 

 modding, these rough flint hatchets will be found much more abundant, 

 and sometimes even sufficiently numerous to be quite characteristic of 

 the particular locality. 



The flint hatchets vary considerably in size and somewhat in shape, 

 and are always of jasper or white quartz. The latter, however, are 



