STOCK-IN-TRADE OF AN ABORIGINAL LAPIDARY. 293 



peculiar kind of work. There are to this day pine-makers among the 

 Ojibway Indians, and probably among other tribes. 



In corroboration of the foregoing, I may state that certain handicrafts 

 were practised to some extent by the North American Indians at the 

 time of their first intercourse with the whites. " They have some," says 

 IvOger Williams, " who follow onely making of Bowes, some Arrowes, some 

 Dishes (and the women make all their Earthen Ycssells), some follow fish- 

 ing, some hunting: most on tlie Sea side make Money, and Store up shells 

 in Summer against Winter whereof to make their money."* These re- 

 marks, of course, relate to the l!^ew England tribes, with whom Eoger 

 Williams used to associate j but a later writer, Lawson, gives a similar 

 account of the Southern Indians, among whom labor was doubtless still 

 more systematized, considering that they had attained a somewhat 

 higher degree of civilization than their Northern kinsmen. It is known 

 that until within late years the manufacture of arrow-heads was prac- 

 tised as a profession by certain individuals among several Indian tribes. 



I will now proceed to describe a deposit of aboriginal manufactures, 

 which illustrates the subject of division of labor among the earlier in- 

 habitants of this country better than any other discovery of kindred 

 character with which I have become acquainted. 



In the spring of 187G, Mr. T. J. E. Keenan, of Brookhaven, Lincoln 

 County, Mississippi, presented to the National Museum a collection of 

 jasper ornaments, mostly uufiuished, which had been found in Lawrence 

 County, in the same State, forming a deposit of a very remarkable 

 Character. Being desirous of learning the particulars of this discovery, 

 I addressed a letter to Mr. Keenan, and obtained from him the desired 

 information. The deposit was accidentally discovered on the farm of 

 Anthony Hutchius, situated on the east side of Silver Creek, about one 

 mile distant from Hebron church, in the northeastern part of the above- 

 named county. While Mr. Huchins's son was engaged ore day in July, 

 1875, in ploughing a cotton-field, entirely free from pebbles and stones of 

 any kind, a grating of the ploughshare attracted his attention, and upon 

 examination he found that he had struck the deposit, which appeared 

 originally to have been buried two feet and a half below the surface, 

 filling an excavation of about eighteen inches in diameter. The 

 arrangement of the articles constituting this deposit will be described 

 hereafter. They all consist of jasper of a red or reddish color, which is 

 sometimes variegated with spots or streaks of a i)ale yellow. But few 

 of these objects, which were undoubtedly designed for ornament, may 

 be considered as entirely finished. 



The following is an inventory of the specimens sent to the National 

 Museum by Mr. Keenan : 



1. Twenty-two pebbles of jasper, showing no work whatever. They 

 are irregular in shape and mostly small, being from half an inch to au 

 inch and one-fourth in size. 



* A Key into the Lauguage of America (London, 1645); Providence, 1327 ; p. 133. 



