PECULIARITIES OF THE DRIFT IMPLEMENTS. 279 



objects.* Nor could any ancient excavations have been made 

 and filled in again without leaving evident traces of the 

 change. Moreover, we may in this case also appeal to the 

 flint implements themselves, which, as we have already seen, 

 agree in color and appearance with the gravel in which they 

 occur ; and it seems, therefore, only reasonable to infer that 

 they have been subjected to the same influences. Moreover, 

 if they belonged to the later Stone period, and had found 

 their way by any accident into these gravels, then they ought 

 to correspond with the other flint implements of the Stone 

 period. But this is not the case. The flakes, indeed, offer no 

 peculiarities of form. Similar splinters of flint, or obsidian, have 

 been used from the want of metal by savage tribes in almost 

 all ages and all countries. The other implements, on the con- 

 trary, are very characteristic. All those hitherto discovered 

 are made of flint, whereas many other minerals, such, for in- 

 stance, as serpentine, jade, clay slate, etc., were used in the later 

 Stone age. Their forms are also peculiar ; some are oval 

 (pi. 1, fig. 11), chipped up to an edge all round, and from two 

 to eight or nine inches in length. They suggest the idea of 

 slingstones, but some of them at least seem too large for such 

 a purpose. A second type is also oval, but somewhat pointed 

 at one end (pi. 1, fig. 10, and figs. 135, 136). Others again 

 figs. 137, 138) have a more or less heavy butt end and are 

 pointed at the other. Mr. Evans seems to regard these f as 

 having served as spear or lance heads. He treats as a mere 

 variety of this type those implements in which the cutting 

 end is rounded off but not pointed. Some of these were 

 evidently intended to be held in the hand, and probably 

 served a different purpose ; they may, I think, fairly be con- 

 sidered as a fourth type, though it must be confessed that all 

 these types run very much into one another, and in any 

 large collection many intermediate forms may be found. The 

 * Blackwood, I.e. f I.e. 1860, p. 11. 



