bear a slight distance only within the margin of the flake, and, however sharp the blow administered, the smooth block of stone on which the flake is placed, and which of course projects beyond it, acts as a stop to prevent the hammer being carried forward so as to injure the form, and brings it up sharply, directly it has done its work of striking off a splinter from the end of the flake. The upper face of the flake remains quite uninjured, and, strange as it may appear, there is no difficulty in producing the evenly circular edge of the scraper by successive blows of the convex pebble.
Some of the other ancient tools and weapons, having one flat face, seem to have been fashioned in much the same manner. In the case of arrow-heads and lance-heads, however, another process would appear to have been adopted. It is true that we know not exactly how
"the ancient arrow-maker
Made his arrow-heads of sandstone,
Arrow-heads of chalcedony,
Arrow-heads of flint and jasper,
Smooth and sharpened at the edges.
Hard and polished, keen and costly."
And yet the process of making such arrow-heads is carried on at the present day by various half-civilized peoples, and has been witnessed by many Europeans, though but few have accurately recorded their observations. Sir Edward Belcher[1] who had seen obsidian arrow-heads made by the Indians of California, and those of chert or flint by the Eskimos of Cape Lisburne, states that the mode pursued in each case was exactly similar. The instrument employed among the Eskimos, which may be termed an "arrow-flaker," usually consists of a handle formed of fossil ivory, curved at one end for the purpose of being firmly held, and having at the other end a slit, like that for the lead in our pencils, in which is placed a slip of the point of the horn of a reindeer, which is found to be harder and more stubborn than ivory. This is secured in its place by a strong thong of leather or plaited sinew, put on wet, which on drying becomes very rigid. A representation of one of these instruments, in the Blackmore Museum at Salisbury, is given in Fig. 8. Another in the Christy Collection[2] is shown in Fig. 9. Another form of instru-
- ↑ Trans. Ethnol. Soc., N.S., vol. i. p. 139. See also Rev. Arch., vol. iii. (1861) p. 341.
- ↑ "Rel. Aquit.," p. 18. For the loan of this cut I am indebted to the executors of the late Henry Christy. The same specimen has been engraved by the Rev. J. G. Wood. "Nat. Hist. of Man," vol. ii. p. 717. Another example from Greenland is figured in Mat., vol. vi. p. 140.
