\\TrATT — ON FLINT IMPLEMENTS AT BEDFORD. 
245 
been taken out of the gravel pit in the adjoining field, excavated to 
a lower depth than usual. This specimen is figured in accompanying 
Plates III. and IV. 
It was suggested in Mr. Prestwich's paper read before the Geolo- 
gical Society, that examinations should be made in other parts of the 
country where the Drift occurs ; but our friends who undertake that 
duty must not be turned from their purpose by some few fruitless 
searches. I have constantly examined the drift in the vicinity of 
Bedford for several years before I succeeded in finding any specimen 
of the flint-implements. It is true that if the pleistocene drift can 
be determined in any district, there is a probability of these relics 
being found also ; but these must be diligently worked for ; and, as 
Mr. Prestwich has remarked, the motto of the workers should be 
" Nil desperandum." 
Note on the Smaller Kind of Large Flint-Implements, by the 
Editor. — The specimen from Bedford, of which we figure both aspects 
in PI. iii, and iv., is an example of the smaller kind of large flint-imple- 
ments, generally regarded as spear-heads, or as hatchets ; but with- 
out asserting them not to have been used for one or other of such pur- 
poses, we would point out that while the one side, or edge from c to d, is 
finely chipped out, the other is not so for its entire length : one por- 
tion, a to h, being either split off flat, as in the present example, or 
left unworked, presenting the natural surface of the flint, some portion 
of which will be seen also below the truncated part in our figures. If 
these instruments be held in the hand this flat part will fit against the 
palm, generally of the right hand, but some will be held easily only 
in the left. The suggestion we would make from this is Whether 
they may not have been used in the hand as flaying-knives to strip 
ofi" the skins ot the great beasts slain with the larger spears, or with 
flake-arrows ? 
We do not wish even to insist on this suggestion ; but we are the 
rather actuated to make it, as very little effort seems as yet to ha^e 
been made to compare the adaptation of these ancient weapons to 
the nature and character of the operations they were required to 
perform. To conpare the fossil implements with those in use by 
the savage tribes of the present day, or with those found in human 
graves is right enough, but it is only one sort of comparison. The 
savage peoples of the present time have no such gigantic beasts as 
the mammoth and its now fossil congeners to contend with, — the 
African chase of the elephant, only, being the nearest approach — nor 
had those of the "grave" period; and it seems only right that we 
should therefore pass beyond the boimds of mere comparison in our 
study of their fossil implements, and endeavour to make out and un- 
derstand the necessary modification of the weapons employed in 
the pursuit and slaughter of the great beasts, as well as in their own 
domestic operations, by that primitive race by whom these flint- 
