554 Notices respecting New Boohs. 



flake, especially in the thicker kinds, producing a form exactly similar 

 to the modern briquet or " strike-a-light " used in France and else- 

 where. These always fit easily to the left hand, and are fit for use 

 with pyrites and tinder even now ; and here again a full description 

 of the modern method of using these implements is given, to furnish 

 argument for the assumption that these ancient chipped flints were 

 made for a specific purpose. 



As before remarked, the vast majority of the worked stones are 

 of flint, which, owing to their conchoidal fracture, can readily be 

 flaked or knapped so as to produce a cutting edge, especially if the 

 chips be removed from alternate sides of the implement, thus pro- 

 ducing that wavy regular edge which is the best test of intentional 

 work. But a considerable number of rounded water-worn blocks 

 of hard rock, such as granite and quartzite, have been found at La 

 Madelaine and Les Eyzies ; and these, varying from 2 to 8 inches in 

 breadth, have invariably a rounded excavation of varying depth ^on 

 one side. These may have been in some instances mortars, as 

 suggested, in which materials could be rubbed or pounded ; but there 

 may be another use to which these stones could be put. In one of 

 the excellent papers detailing the method of procedure adopted by 

 Esquimaux and others for chipping the edges of the arrow-heads, 

 Capfc. Sir. E. Belcher says that the workmen, " selecting a log of 

 wood in which a spoon-shaped cavity was cut, placed the splinter 

 to be worked over it, and by pressing gently along the margin 

 vertically (with an implement of hard reindeer horn), first on one 

 side and then on the other as one would set a saw/' produced finally 

 the desired serrate-edged arrow-head. Whether this hard material 

 would answer the same purpose as the softer block of wood is a 

 matter of conjecture ; but as many of the hollows seem too small for 

 mortars, it is possible they may have had some such use. 



Le Moustier has been the only cave producing ovate implements 

 of the type common in the valley-gravel of the 8omme, and having 

 the same glaze; but in the other caves more delicately chipped lance- 

 heads, flakes of a finer character, and even semilunar neatly dressed 

 implements of Danish type are common in the caves of Laugerie 

 Haute and the Gorge d'Enfer. 



But it is in the implements of bone that the discoveries have been 

 peculiarly rich, both from the artistic and finished nature of the 

 specimens, and from the excellent drawings which ornament some 

 of them. 



The materials are usually reindeer horn, though other bone ma- 

 terial is occasionally employed ; and the implements are of various 

 kinds, from the delicate bone needle with oval eye (which in some 

 cases has been renewed lower down when the first eye was broken) 

 to long pointed dart-heads and barbed harpoons. These latter 

 are precisely similar to those in use among the Esquimaux ; 

 and at the lower end the bone has been so pared away as to leave 

 a projecting boss or ring, which may have been designed both 

 to prevent the head from being thrust too far into the shaft 

 at the risk of breaking or splitting it with the force of the blow, 



