486 INDIAN STONE IMPLEMENTS. 
axes, gouges, skin dressers and grain pestles, were green- 
stone and syenite, and in the Connecticut valley a large por- 
- tion were made from trap rock. Evidently one reason why 
the greenstone and syenite were preferred to the porphyry 
was that these would take the fine finished design far more 
readily than porphyry. We find the difference between these 
rocks, illustrated by the ocean worn stones on the beach; 
while those from trap and greenstone, are as smooth as 
polished metal. Porphyry stones under the same circum- 
stances, while they have a fine general polish, will yet often- 
times have many minute fractures below the level of the 
polished surface. These large implements appear to have 
had their forms first roughly hewn out, then to have been 
worked into shape by picking with sharp pointed stones 
after which they were sometimes polished. The axes as a 
rule were not polished, while the implements used in the 
dressing of skins were, almost uniformly. Sometimes when 
the natural form of the material favored, such as fragments 
of trap rock for pestles and for hoes, but little additional 
work was put upon it, and the implement was but a rough 
affair. 
Of the large implements, as would be presumed from 
their character, it is rare to find any that were broken in the 
process of manufacture, while such as have been marred or 
broken, after having been manufactured, are very common. 
It is stated by those who have made a comparison between 
the large implements of this country and of Europe, that those 
manufactured by the aborigines of this country are hewn, 
picked and sometimes polished ; those of Europe are simply 
hewn. This marked difference, if it is a fact, is not so sin- 
gular as appears at first sight; the material, to a large ex- 
tent, of the European implements, is flint, which, while it 
cannot be surpassed as a material for hewing, yet for pick- 
ing and polishing, would prove very refractory, and it is 
probable that the same motives that led our own aborigines 
to avoid the porphyry, led those of Europe to be content 
