RELICS OF THE STONE AGE IN NOVA SCOTIA PIERS. 29 



beads they intermingle between spaces other beads, as black as 

 those which I have spoken of to be white, made with jet, or cer- 

 tain hard and black wood which is like unto it, which they smooth 

 and make small as they list, and this hath a very good grace. . . . 

 They esteem them more than pearls, gold or silver. .. .But 

 in Port Royal, and in the confines thereof, and towards New- 

 foundland, and at Tadoussac, where they have neither pearls nor 

 vignols, the maids and women do make matachias, with the 

 quills or bristles of the porcupine, which they dye with black, 

 white, and red colours, as lively as possibly may be, for our 

 scarlets have no better lustre than their red dye ; but they more 

 esteem the matachias which come unto them from the Armouchi- 

 quois country, and they buy them very dear ; and that because 

 they can get no great quanity of them, by reason of the wars 

 that those nations have continually one against another. There 

 are brought unto them from France matachias made with small 

 quills of glass mingled with tin or lead, which are trucked with 

 them, and measured by the fathom, for want of an ell." [Book 

 II, chap, xii.] 



" Our savages have no base exercise, all their sport being 

 either the wars or hunting ... or in making implements fit for 

 the same, as Caesar witnesseth of the ancient Germans, or in 

 dancing ... or in passing the time in play." Lescarbot then 

 describes their bows and arrows, but as I have elsewhere 

 referred to this account, it may be here omitted. " They also," 

 he says, " made wooden mases, or clubs, in the fashion of an 

 abbot's staff', for the war, and shields which cover all their 

 bodies. .... As for the quivers that is the women's trade. 

 For fishing: the Armouchiquois which have hemp do make fish- 

 ing lines with it, but ours that have not any manuring of the 

 ground, do truck for them with Frenchmen, as also for fishing- 

 hooks to bait for fish ; only they make with guts bow-strings, 

 and rackets, which they tieat their feet to go upon the snow a 

 hunting. 



" And for as much as the necessity of life doth constrain 

 them to change place often, whether it be for fishing (for every 



