THE STONE AGE IN NOVA SCOTIA.—PATTERSON. 2335 
there was had been levelled by the repeated ploughings the 
ground had undergone. 
A number of stone implements had been found before my 
arrival, and taken away. But on close examination I found 
more,—a small axe, evidently a war axe, which seemed freshly 
ground to a sharp edge, probably immediately before the en- 
counter in which the owner had lost his life, some stone arrow 
and spear-heads, some fragments of rude pottery, some small 
copper knives, an imperfect bone fish spear-head, and a stone 
pipe. 
On exploring around, I discovered that the ground toward the 
shore, within a circuit with a radius of from forty to fifty feet, 
and sloping gently towards the south-west, had been an old 
cemetery. In spots at irregular distances, but from two to four 
feet apart, on digging down I would find, at a depth of from six 
to ten inches, a layer, perhaps about two inches thick, of a rich, 
dark, velvety mould, intermixed with fragments of bones. In 
some cases this extended a length of less than three feet, with 
a breadth of, perhaps, half as much, indicating, as I judged, the 
grave of a single body; but in at least one instance the layer 
was of much greater extent, as if the remains of several bodies 
were joined together. The bones were so decayed that, though 
this might have been owing to my ignorance of anatomy, only 
in a few instances could I recognize what they were. There was 
only one case in which I could trace the position in which the 
body lay. That was on its side, in a crouching position. In 
this case the skull remained in fragments, and had I known the 
modes now adopted by Archzologists for joining the fractured 
portions of skeletons, I might have gathered them and restored 
it, so as to show its original shape. As it was, I was struck with 
the great thickness of the pieces, and brought some of them 
away ; but I have since learned that this is not uncommon among 
barbarous tribes. 
In all these cases, with a single exception, I found prehistoric 
implements, stone axes, knives, arrow and spear-heads, portions 
of bone spear-heads, small copper knives, with fragments of pot- 
tery. It thus appeared that the people to whom these remains 
