22 



buttes. The accompanying figures, from 1 to 12, represenl some of the 

 Halved stones, most of which, and perhaps all, arc rude works of art. 



Many of the accidental forms, as well as those more nearly resembling 

 artificial implements, if they are not actually such, appear greatly to differ in 

 age. Some of the specimens are as sharp and fresh in appearance as if but 

 recently shivered from the parent block, while others are so much worn and 

 so deeply altered from exposure that they look to be of ancient date. In 

 some of these old-looking specimens the jasper, originally brown or black, 

 has become dull white and yellow the depth of one-fourth of an inch from 

 the surface.* 



* In this relation I may take the opportunity to refer to one of the simplest of stone 

 implements, still in use, and which, if it had alone been found among the flaked ma- 

 terials of the buttes, would certainly have been viewed as an accidental spawl. During 

 my stay at Fort Bridger, the Shoshone Indians made a visit to the post and encamped 

 in its vicinity for a week. Being the first time that I had had an opportunity of seeing 

 a tribe of Indians, I felt much interest in observing them. While wandering through 

 their camp I noticed the women dressing buffalo-skins with a stone implement, tbe 

 only one of this material I found in use among them. A serrated scraper of iron was 

 also employed, but the stone implement was clearly a common and important one. It 

 was a spawl from a quartzite bowlder made by a single smart blow with another stone. 

 It is circular or oval, plano-convex, and with a sharp edge. The implement is repre- 

 sented in the accompany iug figure 13, and according to Dr. Carter, who is quite 

 familiar with the language and habits of the Shoshoues, is called by them a u te-sho-a." 

 By a happy accident I learned that it was not a mere recent instrument incidental to 

 the time and place. 



While on an excursion after fossils, in company with Dr. Carter, I noticed on the side 

 of a butte a few weathered human bones, to which I directed the attention of my friend. 

 On further examination, we found others, together with some perforated canines 

 of the elk and one of the identical "teshoa" above described. Dr. Carter observed 

 that the Shoshones sometimes buried their dead upon the top of prominent buttes, 

 and these remains had fallen from the grave of a squaw, which in the course of time 

 had become exposed by the wearing away of the edge of the butte. The bones and 

 elk-tusks were much weathered. Their appearance and the probable circumstance 

 that several years had elapsed before the butte could wear away to reach the grave, 

 appear to be sufficient evidence that the "teshoa" was an implement of common use. 



To this note I may add a remark relating to the perforated canines of the elk. They 

 are worn as ornamental trophies by the Shoshones and other Indians. In a recent 

 number of the American Journal of Science and Art, for 1872, page 241, in a notice 

 "On fossil man of the cavern of Brousse-rousse, in Italy, by E. Biviere." I notice that, 

 besides a human skeleton associated with the bones of many extinct animals, there 

 were also found several flint knives and a number of perforated canines of the stag. 

 In addition to the common form of many of the stone implements, this is a significant fact 

 bearing on the probability of a common origin to the races of man. One of the speci- 

 mens of perforated tusks of the elk from the Indian grave is represented in Fig. 14, 

 at the end of this introductory chapter. 



