44 SMITHSONIAN MISCELLANEOUS COLLECTIONS VOL. 59 



of inscriptions from Greenland's estimated population of ten thou- 

 sand (Dr. Rink) with an organized life exceeding in duration that 

 of English-speaking America from the beginning until now! Brat- 

 tahlid's doorway-lintel, perhaps of the year 995, still held its old posi- 

 tion in the middle of the nineteenth century, but this mansion of 

 Eric and the homes of his long dominant descendants have not 

 favored us with one carven line or letter. Surely we must think that 

 these people were not given to expressing themselves in that way. 



But human opposition and eagerness were certain to discover sup- 

 posed runes and confirmatory vestiges in America when attention 

 was once directed to the subject. Rafn's voluminous Antiquitates 

 Americanae led the way with the Newport "tower" (since clearly 

 shown to have been only Governor Arnold's windmill patterned on 

 an older one in his former English home) and other equally random 

 fancies. Longfellow embodied one of these speculations in a spirited 

 ballad, immortalizing that squalid Fall River " skeleton in armor," 

 whose copper breast-tablet and belt only antedated the ornaments 

 found by Gosnold * in use on Cape Cod, with no hope at all of such 

 honor. 



The Dighton rock-pictures, with the central row of tallymarks, 

 have been many times published since the first copying by Dr. Dan- 

 forth in 1680. The present rate of obliteration would have wiped 

 them quite away before now, if existing conditions had been estab- 

 lished then or a little earlier. 2 Schoolcraft obtained an erudite 

 Algonquian reading from his Ojibway experts, although the tally 

 marks baffled them, and these he called runes, but afterward with- 

 drew the exception. As quoted by Colonel Mallery, 3 his final verdict 

 was : " It is of purely Indian origin, and is executed in the peculiar 

 symbolic character of the Keekeewin." These tally-like marks were 

 still visible when I visited the rock in 1910, but might apparently have 

 been made by any one who could carve the numeral I or an X- 



On the west shore of Mt. Hope Bay, near that noted elevation, 

 is a boulder marked on its top, as it now lies, with the outline of a 

 boat, having the bow enlarged or uplifted, much as a white man's 

 boat will appear when the stern sets low in the water. We saw 

 several like instances on Taunton River soon after inspecting and 

 tracing the one above mentioned. An Indian canoe hardly could be 



1 J. Brereton: A Brief e Relation of the Discoverie by Gosnold. Bibliog- 

 rapher, 1902, p. 33. Also in Old South Leaflets. 



2 See Prof. Greenwood's letter of 1730. Amer. Anthrop., 1908, p. 251. 



3 Fourth Ann. Rep. Bur. Amer. Ethnol. (1882-1883). 



