The Primitive Fish-Hook. 



347 



THE BEGINNING OF A SHELL HOOK. (IN THE COLLECTION OF DR. WEST.) 



dredth meridian, write, referring to these hooks : " These hooks are 

 flattened and are longer than wide. * * * The barbs in these 

 specimens are judged by. fishermen of to-day to be on the wrong 

 side of a good fish-hook, and the point is too near the shank. By 

 having the line so fastened that the point of tension is at the notch 

 at the base of the shank, instead of at the extreme end of the stem, 

 the defect of the design of the hook would be somewhat remedied, 

 as the barb would be forced down, so that it might possibly catch 

 itself in the lower jaw of the fish that had taken the hook." The 

 summing up of this is, I think, that in an imperfect way the maker 

 of this Santa Barbara Hook had some idea of the efficiency of a 

 center-draught hook. As the first step in manufacturing this hook, 

 a hole was drilled in the shell, and the hook finished up afterward by 

 rounding the outside. Dr. West, of Brooklyn, has a series of such 

 primitive work in his collection. 



SHELL HOOK. (NATIONAL MUSEUM. WASHINGTON.) 



