52 



TRANSACTIONS OF THE CANADIAN INSTITUTE. 



[Vol. 1Y. 



Both are drawn natural size and their cutting edge is at the fore-end. 

 Knive fig, 19 was used without handle, but fig. 20 was hafted to a short 

 stick as is manifest from the side notches discernible therein. The 

 identity of these instruments is beyond the possibility of a doubt, as it 

 has been established by the testimony of an old Indian who used him- 

 self similar knives in his youth when no better ones were obtainable. 



The most serviceable and therefore most highly priced working or 

 carving knives in use among the prehistoric Denes were nothing more 

 or less than beaver teeth sharpened when necessary, by friction on a 

 hard stone. But owing to the perishable nature of, the material, none 

 is now available for illustration. The only stone carving knife which has 

 ever fallen under my observation is that herewith figured (fig. 21). I be- 

 lieve it to be of genuine black flint. The cutting edge is at a and it is still 

 very keen. Notches at d and c, though slight enough, appear neverthe- 

 less to be quite intentional, and were it not for the symmetrical rounding 

 off of the broadest end, they would suggest a double handle as the 

 original means of facilitating work therewith. The Indians neither 

 account for these notches, nor satisfactorily, explain the mode of handling 

 the knife. 



i size. 



Fig. 22. ^2 size. 



Fig. 22, represents a picece of broken object the original use of which 

 is likewise problematic. It is of a variety of green marble variegated 

 with yellow and rusty red. The broadest end has been thinned to a dull 

 edge and, except where it shows signs of accidental breakage, it has 

 received an exceedingly fine polish. Indeed, though it has been found 

 here, at Stuart's Lake, I believe it far too skillfully finished to be of 

 Dene manufacture. It must have been imported from the Coast.* But 



