234 



Carvings occur also on the cromlechs lately discovered in the north 

 of Africa, near Constantine. At first they were thought to he designs 

 or characters ; but a more careful examination led to the conviction that 

 they were lines traced by the Arab shepherds with the point of a stone 

 or knife. 



Several of the walls of Pompeii and of the Guard-room of the Pre- 

 torian Cohort, on the Palatine Hill at Eome, are covered with rude 

 scratchings (graffiti) and writings; and at the present day the same 

 fashion continues on public walls and in more retired places — all pro- 

 ceeding from the same spirit of idleness. The love of fiddling and of 

 doing something in idle moments is natural to man in all ages and 

 climes. 



Man, indeed, is the same in all climes, and is instinctively led to do 

 the same thing in the same way under similar circumstances in regions 

 widest apart. As Humboldt remarks — "Nations of very different descent, 

 when in a similar uncivilized state, having the same disposition to sim- 

 plify and generalize outlines, and, being impelled by inherent mental 

 disposition, may be led to produce similar signs and symbols." 



Hence we find identical forms in the carvings and sculpturings in 

 countries the most remote from one another. 



Identical circles, with crosses within them, are found carved on the 

 cromlechs of Scandinavia, on blocks forming an interior chamber of a 

 tumulus at Dowth, and on the rocks near Yeraguas, in America. 



These rude carvings cannot be considered as ornamentation, as their 

 total want of symmetrical arrangement, and the absence of continuity in 

 their repetition, preclude this. 



Some of these traced figures may, however, be like the "bo marke" 

 of the Scandinavians, private marks of property adopted by the Scandi- 

 navian peasants, or like the " totem" of the Ked Indian, the mark of 

 his nation and of the individual. Carving, then, in idle moments is 

 as natural to the savage or rude nature of Scandinavia as to the idler 

 of the present day, who carves his initials or monogram on a tree or 

 bench. 



Sir James Simpson has shown that most of these carvings belong to 

 the Stone age, which was synchronous with the pastoral phase of civi- 

 lization. Some of a ruder description may belong to an earlier age, or 

 the hunting phase. 



