546 REPORT OF NATIONAL MUSEHM, 1891. 



were built of i^lauks, one of whieh, dug uj) in 1853, was elaborately 

 constructed.' Its prow resembled the beak of an ancient galley, the 

 stem was formed of a triangular ])iece of oak, oak pins and metallic 

 nails had been used in fastening the planks to the ribs, ami for caulking 

 wool dipped in tar Lad been emi^loyed^ 



This bofit was lying keel u])i)ermost with the prow pointing straight 

 up the river. In one of the canoes a beautifully polished celt of green- 

 stone was found. In tlu; bottom of another a hole had been closed by 

 means of a plug of cork,^ whicli, as Mr. Geikie remarks, "could only 

 have come ftxim the latitudes of Spain, southern France, or Italy."^ 



Judging, then, from their construction, these vessels represent various 

 arclueological periods, namely, the most primitive ones the Stone age, 

 the more finished the Bronze age, and the reguhirly built boats the Iron 

 age, and their occurrence in one and the same marine formation must 

 be considered as being due to the changes going on continually in the 

 beds of all large l)odies of water by the shifting of the channel, depo- 

 sition, removal, and redei)Osition of sediments. In determining rela- 

 tive data attention should be paid to the stratification of the alluvium 

 in which the objects occur. 



Tlie necessity of pursuing this course is pointed out by Prof. Geikie, 

 as follows : ^' 



"The relative position in the silt from which the canoes were exhumed 

 could help us little in any attempt to ascertain their relative ages, unless 

 they had been found vertically above each other. The varying depths 

 of an estuary, its bardvS of silt and sand, the set of its currents, and the 

 influence of its tides in scouring out alluvium from .some ])arts of its 

 bottom and redepositing it in others are circumstances Avhich require 

 to be taken into account in all such calculati(ms. Mere coincidence of 

 depth from the present surface of the ground, which is tolerably uni- 

 form in level, by no me.ans necessarily proves contemporaneous deposi- 

 tion, nor would such an inference follow even from the occurrence of 

 the remains in distant parts of the very same stratum. A canoe might 

 be capsized and sent to the bottom just beneath low water mark; 

 another might experience a similar fate on the following day, but in 

 the middle of the channel. Both would become silted up on the floor 

 of the estuary; but as that floor would be perhaps 20 feet dee])er in the 

 center than toward the margin of the river, the one canoe might actu- 

 ally be 20 feet deeper in the alluvium than the other, and on the 

 ui)heaval of the alluvial deposit, if we were to argue merely from the 

 depth at which the remains were iml)edded, we should pronounce the 

 canoe found at the one locality to be immensely older than the other, 



^ Lyell, Charles, Aiitiq. of Man, Ist ed., p. 48. 



2 Chambers, B., Aucieut Sea Margins, p. 205. 



^LyeU, Charles, AA\t'u\. of Man, Ist eel., p. 48. 



^ Geikie, James, Geol. Quart. Jour., vol. xviii, p. 224. 



^Geikie, James, Geol. Quart. Jour., vol. xviii, p. 224. 



