Stone Weapons used by the Indians, 3 1 



colonies on the sides of certain bays, rivers, or lakes which had 

 been favourite hunting and fishing grounds from time imme- 

 morial. For example, there is a small detachment living in huts 

 on the left bank of the St. John, opposite Fredericton. Here, 

 among the debris of the middens, I have picked up skulls 

 of the sturgeon, or bones of moose, mink, beaver, and other 

 animals which they continue to hunt, just as will be noted pre- 

 sently, obtains in the case of the ancient refuse heaps of their 

 forefathers ; indeed, in a perpendicular section of the river 

 alluvium on which the above encampment stands you may 

 mark successive deposits of these remains to the depth of 

 several feet. I failed to discern stone implements in undis- 

 turbed strata, but on the beach by the river's margin, and 

 probably washed out of the bank, several stone celts and arrow 

 points were found by the natives. Thus, from the conical shaped 

 birch bark wigwam of the Stone Age, down to the wooden hut 

 of the Iron Age, the same people have sojourned on the old 

 hunting-grounds where, to all appearance, the Melicite and 

 Micmac will end his days, like the last of the Mohicans. 



Fig. 10 represents a stone pot, deeply blackened by smoke, 

 found in the Province, and, as far as the local implements are 

 concerned, may be considered unique. It has been deposited 

 in the Museum of St. John, where I noticed also the curious 

 hammer, fig. 9, which is a stone celt perforated for the handle, 

 with a- belt of ferruginous cement (a) welded round the 

 middle, no doubt with the design of adding to the weight : b 

 is the cutting edge, and c the heel. The celt is about four 

 inches long by two inches in breadth. 



Reverting to the finely polished specimens. Many are so 

 exquisitely fashioned, particularly the arrow edges, that the 

 present race often express wonder how their forefathers fabri- 

 cated such tools without employing metal ; indeed, Noel 

 Mitchell, and other Melicite Indians, who deigned to take any 

 interest in my endeavours to glean this amount of knowledge 

 of their progenitors' habits, were fairly at a loss to realize the 



