454 



REPORT OF NATIONAL MUSEUM, 1896. 



manufacture, together with their use as a means of pleasure, if not 

 of ornament, it is not improper to assign them a pUice here. The 

 United States Xational Museum possesses an extensive series which, 

 for some unexphiined reason, extends into alniost every imaginable 

 disk form. Fig. 110 represents a side and sectional view of one of 

 these objects of yellowish brown quartzite. It is drawn half size, and is 

 a large and weighty object. Most of the large speciiuens are of quartz, 

 either yellow or white. They are disk form, the edges are rounded, 

 ihe center on both sides has been cut out and made cup-shaped. He 

 who could make this object, accomplishing all these requirements from 

 an irregular piece of rude, hard quartz, and produce a S])ecimen of such 

 regularity of form and correctness of design must have been an artist 

 of considerable experience. For, be it understood, that in this, as well 



Fig. 110. 



CHUNGKEE STONE, SIDE AND SECTIONAL VIEWS. YELLOW yUAKTZ. 



McKenzie, Carroll Couiitj^, Tennessee. 



Cat. No. 34fli:f, IJ.S.N.M. ^o natural size. 



as in all foregoing objects, the work was done by hand, and only with 

 the usual tools for hammering, pecking, grinding, smoothing, and 

 polishing. It has been suggested that these may have been made with 

 the lathe, but an investigation shows this not to have been so. 



Beads. — Beads of jasper are not infrequently drilled, and the United 

 States Xational Museum possesses some jasper pieces of extraordinary 

 length — for example, 3 inches — less than f inch in diameter, and a hole 

 half the thickness of the bead drilled through its entire length. This 

 hole is put exactly through the center of the cylinder, without apparent 

 enlargement or smoothing, as though it had been drilled from one end 

 only, but whether done this way or drilled from both ends the delicacy 

 of the work and the precision with which it was done, when remem- 

 bered to have been the work of a savage, is marvelous. 



