44 EELIQUI^E AQUITANIdS. 



In addition to the above, I may indicate hastily various simple implements 

 formed of horn and bone : A large piece of the but of a horn, perforated through 

 the centre, like a crutch-head, for inserting a stout crooked crab-stick used for 

 digging roots, the sharp point being hardened by fire for the purpose. Bones, or 

 horns, wedge- or chisel-shaped, for various purposes among the rest very gene- 

 rally for stripping the soft tender sap-wood of trees during early summer for food. 

 In the interior the Scotch Fir and the Aspen chiefly. Along the coast the 

 Hemlock (Pinus Canadensis), the under sap-wood of which is made into a kind of 

 bread. (A practice of the same kind exists, I think, in the North of Europe, and, 

 I fancy, existed in Germany &c. of old, as now, in some shape, among most 

 barbarous tribes. Hence it is more than probable that among the relics found at 

 Dordogne some implements, either of horn or bone, adapted for this purpose 

 will appear.) Stone mallets. Perforated stones, probably for use with a cord, 

 like a sling. Pebbles that have undergone the action of fire, used for boiling 

 meats, &c., in bark vessels. 



In the hope that the imperfect explanations I have been enabled to furnish will 

 be of some service, I will remark generally that I shall watch with great interest 

 the solution of the problem in which you, and the other gentlemen connected 

 Avith you, are engaged. The relics of which you have sent me copies are unques- 

 tionably of a date anterior to the age of Caesar or Tacitus. This must be inferred 

 from the primitive material of which the weapons are composed. The existence 

 of the Reindeer in Germany in the age of Caesar is sufficiently proved by his own 

 words ; but no evidence has, I think, been adduced until now to show that they 

 ever extended into the most southern province of Gaul ; and indeed I think they 

 could not have been in the habit of migrating thither in Csesar's day, or he would 

 'have mentioned the fact*. In his description of the animal as then existing in 

 Germany there is a mixture of truth and fable, which shows that, having probably 

 himself seen a single antler and some skins, he was indebted to other persons for 

 the remainder of the picture. Yet, putting the fabulous portion aside, there can 

 be no question that he means the Reindeer. I mean in that passage of the 

 6th Book which begins " Est bos cervi figura," &c. Apart from the idea of 

 the Unicorn, the description of the Reindeer is not inapt ; and this we may the 

 more readily allow when we read the next passage, describing the well-known 



* On the contrary, Ciesar, talking of the Hercynian Forest, says distinctly, " Multa in ea genera ferarum 

 nasei constat, qua rdiqiiis in locis non sint: ex quibus," &e., and then goes on to describe the Reindeer, 

 the Urus, &c. (Bel. Gal. vi. 25). 



