112 JOURNAL AND PROCEEDINGS 



likely to make his plug out of the same material as his boat. 

 It is to the alluvial clays, gravels and other drift material filling 

 the valleys of the different rivers throughout Europe and America 

 that we owe most of our knowledge of man in the earlier stages 

 of his career. Lakes, estuaries and the sea-coast have each con- 

 tributed a little towards our store of information, but not to such 

 an extent as the drift filled valleys of ancient rivers. It is, therefore, 

 to these ancient valleys we must look for the earliest records of com- 

 merce, and consequently of civilization. 



Nearly all great movements in the history of man have taken 

 place along the courses of large streams. In our own times we find 

 this to be the case. A new people entering a country naturally settle 

 upon the coast and river valleys first. In America we find the white 

 race settling first upon the sea-coast, next gradually pushing their 

 way along the courses of the great rivers, the St. Lawrence, Hudson, 

 Mississippi and others, and finally when they have obtained the com- 

 plete control of these highways, they push back into the country. 

 This course is useful to settlers in two ways, — in providing security 

 for themselves in the event of disaster in their intercourse with the 

 natives, and also providing a means of outlet for their products, 

 navigation being looked upon as essential to their commercial pros- 

 perity. 



As is the case now, so it was in the prehistoric ages. The rivers 

 of Scotland, England, France and Italy, in Europe, and the Mississ- 

 ippi, Ohio, Hudson, and St. Lawrence all give conclusive evidence 

 that primitive man was perfectly acquainted with the value of 

 water as a means of transportation. When man first made his 

 appearance in Europe, the principal rivers stood at a much higher 

 elevation than at present. They had not then cut the deep chan- 

 nels through which they now run, and what is now the vale of Clyde, 

 with a river running through it, was then an estuary of the sea. 



Considering the numerous facilties for water carriage on the 

 American Continent, it would be somewhat surprising if the prehis. 

 toric inhabitant had not used that means to move from place to 

 place, as his roving nature might prompt him. 



M. Joly, in a recent pubhcation, " Man before Metals," says : 

 " It is impossible to doubt that the first attempts at navigation date 

 from the Archaeolithic Age, when we find buried twenty or thirty 



