132 JOURNAL AND PROCEEDINGS 



and miles from their native habitat and several hundred miles from 

 the shore. In the Huron gravemounds of the Georgian Bay, tropi- 

 cal shells from the Mexican Gulf have been found. 



A very strong evidence of the Indian tribes in the days of the 

 moundbuilders, having an extended commerce which might be treated 

 under this head, is their agricultural advancement. They cultivated 

 the zea maize, a tropical plant, which they brought with them from 

 the south. Tobacco also supplies us with another proof of the same 

 sort. Although extensively used by the various tribes in all matters 

 of ceremonial, its cultivation was altogether confined to the area of 

 the southern states, and from that district it was brought by the more 

 northern peoples. 



I have so far, except in one or two instances, when speak- 

 ing of this ancient commerce, endeavoured to confine the 

 proof of a prehistoric commerce to the age of stone. Brief the notices 

 of the various evidences necessarily have been, but to my mind con- 

 clusive enough to show that the earliest peoples on both continents 

 had, during the socalled stone period, whether we divide it into two 

 epochs or treat it as a whole, a species of commercial relationship 

 with each other Limited no doubt it was, but still the spirit of trade 

 existed and showed itself under the many adverse circumstances, by 

 which it was surrounded. These people were undoubtedly a migra- 

 tory class, hunting and fishing their simple though arduous and dan- 

 gerous occupation ; hunting especially so. When we consider the 

 defenceless state of early man, the inefficiency of his arms, and the 

 foes with which he had to contend, we can hardly wonder at the want 

 of improvement shown by him in the earlier stages of his career. The 

 descriptions given by Palaeontologists of the two most formidable 

 enemies of man — the cave lion and cave bear — show these animals to 

 have been no mean opponents of man, even under much more favor" 

 able circumstances than those in which they came in contact, " Man," 

 says Professor Boyd Dawkins, " disputed with the lion ; sometimes 

 man ate the lion and often the lion ate the man." 



The rudiments of art were not wanting among the neolithic men. 

 We find many of their implements and arms richly decorated with 

 carvings of various sorts and often polished in a high degree. In 

 addition, pieces of mammoth tusks and reindeer horns have been 

 discovered, having rude drawings of various subjects cut upon them. 



