ANCIENT STONE IMPLEMENTS — ETHEKIDGE. 25 



The mortar (Plate vi., fig. 1) weighs 30 lbs., and consists of mica 

 schist. It is more or less heraldic shield-shaped in outline, 

 truncated at the base, and with its upper outer edge broad and 

 bevelled outwards The length is fourteen inches, the width 

 twelve, and five inches at the deepest point. '1 he interior ha* 

 been unequally worn, the deeper hollow at the truncated 

 end, the smoothed or ground surface being very apparent. In 

 common with the next object to be noticed, it was found at a 

 depth of eight feet from the surface, but whether the two were 

 discovered together 1 am unable to say. We have no stone 

 mortars from New Guinea for comparison with this ancient 

 implement, but from the Marshall Bennett Islands and from 

 Woodlark Island we possess large, heavy, and slightly concave 

 (on one surface) stones used for sharpening stone adze-heads on ; 

 these are much rougher, more primitive, and less concave than 

 the Yodda Valley mortar. The nearest illustration I have seen 

 is that of a rough stone mortar from the Solomon Islands figured 

 by Edge-Partington.- 



The second specimen (Plate vi., fig. 2) presented by Mr. Jouberl 

 might at first sight be put aside a- fortuitous, but L believe it to 

 have been manufactured. It is a piece of clay-stone, ten indies 

 long, four inches wide, and generally speaking dagger-shaped and 

 compressed ; it weighs 3 lbs. It is flattened on one face and 

 somewhat arched on the other. When viewed sideways there is 

 nothing of moment to remark, but when looked at on either face 

 there is an unmistakable conventional resemblance to the human 

 form. At any rate this is so to the eye of a student accustomed 

 to follow the hundred-and-one conventionalised modifications 

 under which it and other natural objects are concealed in 

 Western Pacific carvings and drawings. As to the figure itself. 

 above is a rounded (in outline) compressed portion answering to 

 a head, cut off by a neck and unsymmetrical shoulders from the 

 long pointed body, in which there is no division into limbs. On 

 the arched aspect of the implement is a central longitudinal 

 ridge. The object of this must remain unknown ; it is certainly 

 not a pounder. 



Ceitain stones used by the New Caledonians as a fetish, or 

 charm, for success in fishing, or buried by the sorcerer in yam 

 plantations to render the ground fruitful, bear a general resem- 

 blance." We have in our collection a semi-human w T ooden figure 

 from Easter Island terminating below in an undivided pointed 

 and rounded base. 



2 Edge-Partington — Atlas, 2nd Series, pi. Ill, f. 5. 



3 Edge-Partington — Atlas, 3rd Series, pi. 71, f. 4 and .">. 



