MALLERY. | PETROGLYPH ON VANCOUVER ISLAND. 45 
grooves, about two or three fingers’ breadth, and in many places are 
so weathered as to be hardly recognizable. They have been scraped 
into the rock probably by the points of sticks rubbing moist sand 
against it. Nomarks of blows of any kind are found. The figures are 
here given in the same relative position in which they are found on the 
rock, except that the upper one on the right hand is at a distance from 
all the others, at the southern end of the rock. The objects represented 
are evidently fishes or marine monsters. The middle figure to the left 
of the cleft may be a manned boat, the fore part of which is probably 
destroyed. 
Dr. Boas says that the copy as found in the Verhandlungen is incor- 
rect. The design on the right hand is reversed and is now corrected. 
Mr. G. M. Sproat (a) mentions this petroglyph: 
Itis rudely done and apparently not of an old date. There are half a dozen figures 
intended to represent fishes or birds—no one can say which. The natives affirm that 
Quawteaht made them. In their general character these figures correspond to the 
rude paintings sometimes seen on wooden boards among the Abts, or on the seal- 
skin buoys that are attached to the whale and halibut harpoons and lances. The 
meaning of these figures is not understood by the people; and I dare say if the 
truth were known, they are nothing but feeble attempts on the part of individual 
artists to imitate some visible objects which they had strongly in their minds. 
SECTION 2. 
UNITED STATES. 
Drawings or paintings on rocks are distributed generally over the 
greater part of the territory of the United States. 
They are found on bowlders formed by the sea waves or polished by 
ice of glacial epochs: on the faces of rock ledges adjoining lakes and 
streams; on the high walls of canyons and cliffs; on the sides and roofs 
of caves; in short, wherever smooth surfaces of rock appear. Yet, 
while they are so frequent, there are localities to be distinguished in 
which they are especially abundant and noticeable. They differ mark- 
edly in character of execution and apparent subject-matter. 
An obvious division can be made between the glyphs bearing char- 
acters carved or pecked and those painted without incision. There is 
also a third, though small, class in which the characters are both incised 
and painted. This division seems to coincide to a certain extent 
with geographic areas and is not fully explained by the influence of 
materials; it may, therefore, have some relation to the idiosyncrasy or 
development of the several authors, and consequently to tribal habitat 
and migrations. 
In examining a chart of the United States in use by the Bureau of 
Ethnology, upon which the distribution of the several varieties of 
petroglyphs is marked, two facts are noticeable: First, the pecked and 
incised characters are more numerous in the northern and those ex- 
pressed in co!crs more numerous in the southern areas. Second, there 
