90 FOSSIL MEN. 



also been found of a potter's graving implement for 

 forming these patterns. It was a small, neatly polished 

 conical bone, sharp at one end and hollowed at the 

 other, so that it could be used either for drawing lines 

 or for stamping circles, precisely like those on some of 

 the specimens of pottery. 



The patterns on the pottery are not merely capri- 

 cious. They are imitations, and of two distinct styles. 

 One evidently represents the rows of grain in the ear 

 of Indian corn, and may be called the corn-ear pat- 

 tern. The same device is seen in specimens of Indian 

 pottery from New York figured by Schoolcraft, and it 

 still occasionally re-appears in our common earthen- 

 ware pitchers. The second may be called the basket- 

 and-bead pattern, and imitates a woven basket orna- 

 mented with beads, or, as in modern Indian baskets, 

 with pendant rings. To this class belong the so-called 

 chevron and saltier patterns, and it is possible that 

 they may be originally traced, bofch in the old and 

 new worlds, to the aboriginal practice of moulding 

 pottery in woven grass baskets, subsequently removed 

 by the process of baking. Many and elegant modifi- 

 cations of this pattern occur, and imply that the 

 potters were familiar with the modes of basket-making 

 still in use among the Indians. This basket-pattern 

 appears, though in a rude form, in some specimens of 

 early British pottery, and akin to it are the impres- 

 sions, common both in American and European clay 

 vessels, of twisted thongs or cords. A third pattern, 

 which is confined to the round bottom of some of 



