122 TlMEHRI. 
(p. 235), on Barbadian shell implements may well find 
a place here : — 
" In Barbados there is no hard stone, nothing harder than coralline 
limestone ; the aborigines therefore were obliged to import hard stone 
implements from the other islands, or from the main continent of South 
America. For ordinary purposes, however, they used implements 
made of various kinds of marine shells, and of the fossil shells from 
the limestone. These shell implements vary in length from one and a 
half to six and a half inches ; some in my possession are beautifully 
formed. In the commonest type the natural curve of the shell formed 
the handle. Discs and beads made of shell, and large quantities of 
pottery in a fragmentary state, have been found associated with the 
shell implements. The use of an implement somewhat resembling a 
hone has not been satisfactorily ascertained, only one specimen * out 
of the considerable number which have passed through my hands being 
worn down by use. The large number of implements discovered 
under rock-shelters, and in gullies, proves the existence of a large 
native population in Barbados ; and as shell hatchets are not found in 
the other West Indian Islands, it is clear that they are of purely local 
origin. In the parish of St. James several cart-loads of shell imple- 
ments were found lying together ; they were carried away to macadamise 
a road. Near the chapel of St. Luke, in a small gully, at the very 
centre of the island, I picked up seven shell implements in the space 
of ten minutes, as well as a quantity of pottery. The favourite spots 
for the habitation of the shell-workers seem to have been under rock. 
shelters, at the entrance of caves in the limestone rocks, and upon the 
sloping sides of the numerous " gullies " which form the most charac- 
teristic feature of the scenery in Barbados. " Indian River " in St 
Michael's parish, the neighbourhood of the fresh water springs on the 
borders of St. Michael's and St. James's, and the springs on the Cod- 
rington College estates in St. John's, appear all to have been centres of 
population." 
One passage in the above remarks requires correction. 
It is obvious from the evidence brought together in these 
pages that the use of implements of shell was not pecu- 
liar to Barbados. The old inhabitants of Nevis certainly 
* This specimen is now in the Christy Collection, British Museum. 
