THE VICTOUIAN NATURALIST. 89 



Hundreds of chips and flakes still lie on the bottom of the 

 hole, and it would be of great interest to have the banks of the 

 hole, some four feet deep, scraped down, and to sink in the 

 bottom of the hole in order to ascertain to what depth the relics 

 of man descend. 



It would be to the interest of science if members of the club, 

 when in the field, would look for chips and flakes of siliceous 

 and tough rocks ; a single hatchet could not have been formed 

 unless scores of chips had been struck off the stone, and a 

 " knife " was absolutely necessary to an aborigine, and one might 

 certainly expect, if man had formerly occupied a locality, to 

 find traces of his presence by chips and flakes of tough igneous 

 rocks or sharp siliceous stones. As these chips do not at first 

 sight appear to differ much from small stones that may have 

 assumed their present forms without the direct intervention of 

 man, it may be as well to point out on what evidence they may 

 be regarded as indicating that they are of human production. 

 Sharp-edged, thin chips of stone are sometimes found in superficial 

 deposits of fine sand, clay, or sandy loam. How are they to be 

 accounted for in such a position ? The current that carried mud 

 or very fine sand could not move small stones, and stones when 

 rolled any distance lose their sharp angles. Without resorting 

 to theories of floating ice or uprooted trees, it is better to regard 

 the stones as being relics of man, and to look for further evidence. 

 Quartz pebbles are often found, some all watervvorn, some part 

 waterworn and part angular, showing that flakes had been struck 

 from them. Burnt stones are common — any stones of the im- 

 mediate locality — some angular, some waterworn, but, with the 

 exception of basalt, all so brittle that they will shatter with a tap 

 of the hammer. These stones have been subjected to the action 

 of fire in the "ovens" of the blacks. Evidence may be gathered 

 from the chips individually and collectively. Individually if the 

 flake shows signs of having been chipped to a rude form, as an 

 oval, or to a more oblong form of " knife," or to a triangular 

 spear point, or if a cutting edge has been worked up on the flake 

 by numerous minute chips having been struck from it, or if the 

 chip clearly shows the bulb of percussion, then it may be put in 

 as evidence. Collect as many chips as possible from a formation, 

 ascertain the variety of rock, note if the scraps of stone differ 

 from the rocks of the immediate locality or of the watershed 

 which is being searched. Perhaps the valley where you collect 

 the flakes may be a basaltic one, and the chips that you gather 

 may be all of flint, jasper, quartz, quartzite, porphyry, &c, 

 then the evidence from the chips, considered collectively, most 

 clearly indicates that some of the few scraps of stone that you 

 hold in your hand were once the prized possessions of some 

 dusky warrior, and they may have been undisturbed for thousands 



