METALLIC IMPLEMENTS OF NEW YORK INDIANS 11 
which they lay down their children; and these little bits of copper 
which they were carrying away, are the playthings and diversions 
of savage children, who play together with little stones.” One 
said it was the Thunder spoke; one the god Missibizi; another 
the water men. Two Indians died on the way home, the others 
soon after, and no one dared visit the floating island again. 
A friend of the writer, the late Dr P. R. Hoy, of Racine Wis. 
_ published two papers in 1886 on the important questions, How 
and by whom were the copper implements made? The first paper he 
read in 1876, the second in 1882. That they were not cast he 
showed, because the aborigines could not produce the heat re- 
quired, but copper could be softened by judicious applications of 
heat and cold. He thought that implements were hammered or 
pressed into shape in stone molds, and made successful experi- 
ments. Lastly, he thought most native copper articles were 
made after the white men came, a conclusion not so easily proved. _ 
His arguments will not be reproduced here, but some of his facts _ 
__will be mentioned. 
Copper articles were made near Lake Superior for export and 
trade elsewhere. In 1882 there were found. 26 copper imple- 
ments close together, under a small pile of stones at the Sault 
Ste Marie. In the lot were six awls from 3 to 6 inches long, 
five knives of various sizes, and 16 axes, hammers and chisels. 
These must have been made for trade. For recent use he cites 
witnesses to the copper implements used by the modern Chippe- 
was and Winnebagoes. One Indian agent certified that when he 
first came among the latter, “many of them carried lances 
headed with copper, and it was quite common to see arrows 
headed with copper.” These points may have been like those 
used by the Iroquois 250 years ago. Out of over a hundred 
mounds opened near Racine none contained copper. Among hun- 
dreds of native copper implements in the Perkins collection not 
one came from a mound. This led him to conclude that such 
articles were later than the mound builders. } 
Great quantities of native copper-ornaments have been found 
in Ohio mounds. Mr Warren K. Moorehead took three or four 
thousand spool-shaped ornaments out of the Hopewell mounds 
