48 NEW YORK STATE MUSEUM 



have become chalky white in color, and in some cases so sott as 

 to permit whittling with a sharp knife. Other objects have suf- 

 fered surface changes from the original dull black of the stone to 

 a lustrous yellow, or buff, or mottled color, according to the dif- 

 ference in soils in which they were imbedded. Such changes in 

 the appearance and structure of flint can come only through ex- 

 ceedingly long and slow processes, and are occasioned by the 

 percolation through soil of water charged with certain chemical 

 elements, the effect upon the stone being the disintegration or 

 final breaking down of one of the two kinds of silica of which it 

 is composed. 



The older artifacts occur mainly on a few" extensive sites about 

 the southern end of Lake George ; at East Lake George ; at Glen 

 lake, and on a large site on the eastern town line about half way 

 between Dunham's bay and the Hudson river at Sandy Hill. 

 These sites, which Doctor Beauchamp calls " Early sites," are 

 easily recognized by the initiated, on account of the remains 

 they yield. Massi^^e spear or lance heads, thick and heavy, yet 

 in many cases almost as symmetrical and orderly in construction 

 as if they had been wrought by machinery instead of by hand 

 and eye ; knives of flint and fine sandstone, thin and carefully 

 wrought, leaf-shaped in form and edged all around, flaked by 

 unground axes of sandstone and quartzite ; acutely edged, finely 

 shaped adzes and gouges of fine sandstone, of hollow and round- 

 backed types ; on the waterside sites large flaked disks of coarse 

 sandstone, worked to an edge all around. 



Following these traces of earlier men in Warren county, are 

 the rather more broadly-sown of the two succeeding populations 

 of dift'erent habits and instincts from their predecessors, and in 

 these same respects also differing quite as much from each 

 other. Our present knowledge in the matter does not definitely 

 justify us in saying which was the earlier of the two, but their 

 large and often curiously decorated pestles and mortars of stone 

 show that they had a knowledge of agriculture. The Eskimo 

 relics discovered point this people as once inhabiting our lands. 

 For the sake of convenience only, we will turn our attention 

 first to the traces of the first-mentioned people, in an endeavor 

 to outline their habitat and realize something of their character 

 and employments. They were agriculturists, huntsmen and 

 fishermen, drawing from soil and fo-rest and lake and river, 

 their means of living. This signifies that they were a people of 



