Too IK 

 Traditions 



SCIENTIFIC SIDE-LIGHTS 



3443. TOOLS, ANCIENT INDIAN 



Provided with Carefully Wrought Handles 

 The Grip a Matter of Thought and Care. 

 The ingenuity of the American mechanic in 

 hafting his tools and bringing them to their 

 work cannot be overlooked. In this study 

 the archeologist must learn of the ethnolo- 

 gist. The study of hafting must take into 

 consideration the grip and the attachment. 

 The grip of the implement may be a part 

 of the object itself, or it may be a separate 

 piece fastened on. In the Eskimo scrapers, 

 women's knives, men's knives, throwing- 

 sticks, and harpoons, the greatest care was 

 taken to have the grip so fit the hand and 

 fingers that the greatest force and dexterity 

 could be used in operating them. MASON 

 Aboriginal American Mechanics (Memoirs of 

 the International Congress of Anthropology, 

 p. 74). (Sch. P. C.) 



3444. TOOLS AND WEAPONS OF 

 PRIMITIVE MAN Alike in Europe and 

 America. The simple weapons of bone and 

 stone found in America closely resemble 

 those which occur in other countries. The 

 flakes, hatchets, axes, arrow-heads, and 

 bone implements are, for instance, very simi- 

 lar to those which occur in the Swiss 

 lakes, if only we make allowance for the 

 differences of material. . . . [There are 

 many] simple forms, which may almost be 

 said to be ubiquitous. AVEBUBY Prehistor- 

 ic Times, ch. 8, p. 237. (A., 1900.) 



3445. TOOLS FITTED TO ENVIRON- 

 MENT Habitat Determines Material and Uses. 

 The tool of the artisan is fitted to the 

 hand; but to the scrutinizing glance of the 

 student it is just as nicely fitted to its 

 environment, to the work which it has to 

 perform, to the grade of industrial education 

 which the owner has reached, to the genius 

 of his people, and even to their language 

 and mythology. The director of a large 

 museum, on examining an implement new 

 to him, is quite as likely to fix his attention 

 upon the region, or the work to be done, 

 or the standing of the owner, as upon his 

 blood or nationality. The continent of 

 America was largely the director of the 

 arts of the aborigines. MASON Aboriginal 

 American Mechanics (Memoirs of the Inter- 

 national Congress of Anthropology, p. 70). 

 (Sch. P. C.) 



3446. TOUCH, SENSE OF, IN 

 WORMS Shape of Objects Discovered. If 

 worms are able to judge, either before draw- 

 ing or after having drawn an object close 

 to the mouths of their burrows, how best 

 to drag it in, they must acquire some notion 

 of its general shape. This they probably ac- 

 quire by touching it in many places with the 

 anterior extremity of their bodies, which 

 serves as a tactile organ. It may be well 

 to remember how perfect the sense of touch 

 becomes in a man when born blind and deaf, 

 as are worms. If worms have the power of 

 acquiring some notion, however rude, of the 



shape of an object and of their burrows, as 

 seems to be the case, they deserve to be 

 called intelligent; for they then act in near- 

 ly the same manner as would a man under 

 similar circumstances. DABWIN Formation 

 of Vegetable Mouldy ch. 2, p. 28. (Hum., 

 1887.) 



3447. TOWERS, SPIRES, AND PIN- 

 NACLES OF ICE Nature's Architecture. 

 When a glacier descends a precipice it may 

 become broken and fall in detached blocks, 

 thus forming veritable ice cascades; but the 

 fragments unite again at the base of the 

 cliffs and become reconsolidated, and the ice 

 flows on as a continuous stream. At other 

 times the descent is completely covered with 

 ice so shattered as to be impassable, and 

 presents all degrees of diversity between ice 

 cascades and ice rapids. The places of steep 

 descent in the floor of a neve frequently 

 lead to the breaking of the snow and ice 

 into cubical blocks of all dimensions up 

 to hundreds of feet in diameter, which bear 

 a striking resemblance to towers and other 

 architectural forms, and add most attrac- 

 tive features to the scenery of glacier-cover- 

 ed regions. During night marches on the 

 glaciers of Alaska, the writer could scarcely 

 put aside the idea that these shadowy forms, 

 partially illuminated by the northern twi- 

 light, were in reality the ruins of marble 

 temples. In the lower portions of glaciers, 

 where the ice is more solid and where sur- 

 face melting is more rapid, the steep de- 

 scents are marked by spires and pinnacles 

 having extremely rugged and angular forms, 

 separated by profound crevasses. RUSSELL 

 Glaciers of North America, int., p. 10. (G. 

 & Co., 1897.) 



3448. TRACK OF VANISHED GLA- 

 CIER Rocks Polished as by Lapidary. Rock 

 surfaces that have been subjected to the 

 grinding of an ice sheet, or crossed by even 

 a small Alpine glacier, are frequently found 

 to be worn and the angles and prominences 

 rounded and planed away. All weathered 

 and oxidized portions of the preglacial sur- 

 face are removed, and the fresh hard rock 

 exhibits a polish approaching that given 

 by marble-workers to finished monuments. 

 The hardest and finest-grained rocks receive 

 the most brilliant polish. Limestone, gran- 

 ite, and quartzite, especially, are frequently 

 so highly burnished that they glitter in the 

 sunlight with dazzling brilliancy. On such 

 surfaces there are usually scratches and 

 grooves, frequently in long, parallel lines, 

 which show the direction in which the ice 

 moved over them. These markings vary in 

 size from delicate, hairlike lines, such as 

 might be made by a crystal point, to heavy 

 grooves and gouges, a foot and sometimes 

 several feet deep, which frequently run in 

 one general direction for many yards and 

 even several rods, and indicate by their 

 straightness and evenness that the engine 

 which made them was one of great power 



