HOLMES] ABORIGINAL AMERICAN ANTIQUITIES PART I 367 



means of a pitching tool of bucli:liorn. This was effected in several ways, 



usually by clamping it in a folded pad of buckskin under 



[Use of Hammer ^^le knee against a hammer stone (anvil stone) or notched 



wooden block, so that the projecting edge rested over the 



margin or else over the pit of the stone, or notch if a block or log were used 



and with one hand holding the point of the pitching tool very lightly and 



slantingly and at a wide angle against or just over the points to be chipped, 



sharply tapping the tool with a maul or with a knapping hammer. Thus the 



blade was quickly thinned down and made almost even edged. It was now 



further shaped, sharpened, nocked, or barbed or serrated, 



[Speciahzing with according to intended use, and tanged with a rounded, flat 

 a Bone] 



bodkin of horn (seized to a stick or handle for leverage at 



one end and tapering therefrom to a curved, blunt point), either by laying it 



on a folded buckskin, over the hollow of a hammer stone or the palm of 



the left hand, pressing it downward along the edges at nearly right angles, 



and always slantingly to its length, or else holding it edge up between the 



thumb and all the fingers of the left hand and freely flaking it, with the rod 



held in the right hand, with handle braced against the ribs for steadying, by 



pressing the sharp edges until they caught in the point or blade of the bodkin, 



and twistingly wrenching them off by a most dextrous motion, which I can 



exhibit but not adequately describe or illustrate. 



All this sounds complicated and tedious, but I have succeeded, from the 



time I found a suitable pebble of fine-grained, ringing, cold, and fresh quartzite, 



in making seven finished knife and arrow blades in exactly 38 minutes, and 



I have often made from obsidian or glass a very small and delicate arrow 



point — the most easily made, by the way — in less than 2 minutes.* 



1 dishing, The Arrow, pp. 205-210. 

 38657°— 19— Bull. GO, pt i 25 



