THE STONE AGE — PAST AND PEESENT. 193' 



sponge, or such thing, has been washed, leaving a convenient 

 hole through the flint to tie it by ; but they have been known 

 to turn such a perforated flint into a hammer, by fixing a 

 handle in the hole.^ And lastly, the women who shell almonds 

 in the south of France still use a smooth water-worn pebble 

 [couede, couedou), as their implement for breaking the shells. 



The distinction between natural and artificial implements is of 

 no practical value in estimating the state of culture of a Stone- 

 Age tribe. A natural chip or fragment of stone may have been 

 now and then used as an edged or pointed tool ; but we have 

 not the least knowledge of any tribe too low habitually to shape 

 such instruments for themselves. There is, however, a well- 

 marked line of distinction in the Stone Age which divides it 

 into a lower and a higher section. We have no historical know- 

 ledge of any tribe who have used stone instruments, and have 

 not been in the habit of grinding or polishing some of them. 

 But there are remains which clearly prove the existence of such 

 tribes, and thus the Stone Age falls into two divisions, the Un- 

 gi"ound Stone Age and the Ground Stone Age.^ 



To the former and ruder of these two classes belong the in- 

 struments of the Drift or Quaternary deposits, and of the early 

 bone caves, and, in great part at least, those of the Scandinavian 

 shell-heaps or kjokkenmoddings. Even should a few ground 

 instruments prove to belong to these deposits, the case would 

 not be much altered, for the finding of hundreds of unground 

 implements unmixed with ground ones would still show a vast 

 predominance of chipping over grinding, which would justify 

 their being classed in an Unground Stone Age, quite distinct 

 from the Ground Stone Age in which modern tribes have been 

 found living. 



The rude flint implements found in the drift gravels of the 

 Quaternary {i. e. Post-Tertiary) series of strata, belong to the 

 earliest known productions of human art. Since the long un- 

 appreciated labours of M. Boucher de Perthes showed the histo- 

 rical importance of these relics, the date of the first appearance 

 of man on the earth has been much debated. I have no pur- 

 pose of attempting to discuss the collection of geological and 

 ' Klemm, C. W., part ii. p. 12. '^ See Mr. Lubbock's Lectures, etc. 



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