178 ADDRESS. [LECT. 



heads, swords, picks, awls, slingstones and many other 

 forms ; these, too, found not singly or in small numbers 

 but by hundreds and thousands, I might say tens of 

 thousands, attest the important part which has been 

 played by stone in the early stages of the development 

 of the human race. For our knowledge of this period 

 we are mainly indebted, firstly, to the shell mounds or 

 refuse heaps of Denmark so well studied by Steenstrup 

 and Worsaae ; secondly, to the tumuli or burial mounds ; 

 thirdly, to the remains found in caves ; and fourthly, to 

 the Swiss lake dwellings, first made known to us by 

 Keller, and afterwards studied with so much zeal and 

 ability by Morlot, Troyon, Desor, Schwab and other Swiss 

 archaeologists. 



From these sources we get some idea of the conditions 

 of life existing during the Stone Age. 



The use of pottery was known, but the potter's wheel 

 does not seem to have been as yet discovered. Man was 

 clothed in skins, but partly also, in all probability, in 

 garments made of flax. His food was derived principally 

 from animals killed in the chase, but he had probably 

 domesticated the ox as well as the goat, the pig and 

 the dog, nor was he altogether ignorant of agriculture. 

 Traces of dwellings of this period have been found in 

 various parts of England ; and in this county, the curious 

 circular depressions at Stourhead, known as the Pen pits, 

 perhaps belong to it. These dwellings consisted of pits 

 sunk into the ground, and probably covered by a roof 

 consisting of branches of trees, over which again a coat- 

 ing of turf and earth may probably have been placed. 

 The Swiss lake dwellings of this period were constructed 

 on platforms supported on piles driven into the muddy 



