IMPLEMENTS BEAEING SIGNIFICANT MARKS. 199 



Mr. William Morris in his Poem "The Life and Death of Jason"*, where, 

 speaking of an arrow, with iron head and carved stem of wood, that had been 

 shot by Natives on shore against the Argonauts, he says : 



But Jason from the mast the arrow broke, 

 That erewhile had so scantly missed his life, 

 And found it scored as by a sharp-edged knife, 

 From barb to notch, with what seemed written words, 

 In tongue unknown to aught but beast and birds. 

 So when Medea saw it, straight she said : 

 " Fair love, now praise some God thou art not dead, 

 For from the Cimbrian folk this arrow came, 

 And its sharp barbs within a wizard's flame 

 Were forged with peril, and the shaft of it 

 Was carved by one who in great fear did sit 

 Within the haunted places of the wood, 

 And tears are on its feathers, and red blood." 



IV. As to other Markings, ornamental or otherwise, on some Implements. 

 Besides the Dart-heads and other articles bearing marginal scorings, we meet 

 with stick-like implements that are crossed with lines at more or less regular 

 intervals, some also having short deep notches along the edges, both kinds 

 having probably been used as Tally-sticks and Gambling-scores. 



1. Such is the fragment of a narrow flat implement, made of antler, from 

 Aurignac, described and figured in the 'Ann. Sc. Nat.' ser. 4, vol. xv. pp. 189 & 

 251, pi. 11. fig. 7, with its two rounded crenulated edges (18 notches on one 

 edge, and 19 on the other, in obscure groupings), and with one of its faces 

 marked with the remains of two regular series of incised lines reaching from 

 edge to edge, but not corresponding to the little marginal notches. Figure 5, 

 B. Plate XXV., also belongs to the same category, bearing perhaps the score of 

 some game. 



2. From La Madelaine we have an imperfect, flat, tapering implement of 

 carved antler, figs. 4 a-c, B. Plate XXV., bearing on one side eleven straight, 

 more or less deeply and broadly cut lines reaching across, with pairs of badly 

 cut suboval cipher-like outlines alternating with eight of them ; and on the other 

 face there are only six, transverse, shallow and curved lines towards the thinnest 

 end. The four angles are strongly notched at rather irregular intervals, with 

 five or six notches each ; and the cut lines rarely correspond with these. 



* London : Bell and Daldy. 1867, 8vo, p. 180. 



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