children know, saying, Israel came over this Jordan on dry land." In Moab, De Sauley observed rude stone avenues, and other monuments, which he compares to Celtic dolmens; and Stanley saw, a few miles to the north of Tyre, a circle of rough upright stones.

Remains, more or less similar, occur, however, in very different parts of the world; thus, in Algeria MM. H. Christy and L. Feraudt have recently examined a large number of cromlechs, stone-circles, and other ancient remains, very closely resembling those, which, in Northern Europe, we have been in the habit of ascribing to the Druids. They occur in great numbers; indeed, in the neighbourhood of Constantine, MM. Christy and Feraud saw more than a thousand, in three days. They opened fourteen of the cromlechs, all of which turned out, as might have been expected, to be places of burial. The corpse had been deposited in a contracted position, accompanied sometimes by rings of copper or iron, worked flints, and fragments of pottery; in one case even by a coin of Faustina, who lived in the second century after Christ.

Again, Arctic travellers mention stone-circles, and stonerows, among the Esquimaux, though it would appear that these stone-circles are quite small, and merely form the lower part of their habitations.

Thus, then, it is evident that similar monuments have been erected in very different countries, and at very different periods; generally, however, in honor of some distinguished man, or to commemorate some great event.

* Joshua iv. 21, 22.

+ Recueil des notices et Mémoires de la Société Archéologique de la Province de Constantine, 1863, p. 214.

CHAPTER III.

THE USE OF STONE IN ANCIENT TIMES.

THE

preceding chapters have been devoted to the age

of Bronze. We must now revert to still earlier times and ruder races of men; to a period which, for obvious reasons, is called by archæologists the Stone age.

The Stone age, however, if by this we signify merely the ante-metallic period, falls naturally, as has been already stated, into two great divisions.

First. The period of the drift, which I have proposed to call the Archæolithic period.

Secondly. The Neolithic, or later Stone age, which we must now consider, in which the stone implements are more skilfully made, more varied in form, and often polished.

The immense number of stone implements which occur, in all parts of the world, is sufficient evidence of the important part they played in ancient times. M. Herbst has favored me with the following interesting statement of the number of stone and bone implements in the Copenhagen Museum:

And if duplicates and broken specimens were counted, he thinks that the number would be between 11,000 and 12,000. He has also had the kindness to estimate for me the numbers in private and provincial museums, and, on the whole, he believes we shall be within the mark, if we consider that the Danish museums contain 30,000 stone implements, to which moreover must be added the rich stores at Flensborg and Kiel, as well as the very numerous specimens with which the liberality of the Danish archæologists has enriched other countries; so that there is scarcely any important collection in Europe, which does not possess some illustrations of the Danish stone implements.

The museum of the Royal Irish Academy includes nearly 700 flint flakes, 512 celts, more than 400 arrow-heads, and 50 spear-heads, besides 75 "scrapers," and numerous other objects of stone, such as slingstones, hammers, whetstones, querns, grain-crushers, etc. Again, the museum at Stockholm is estimated to contain between 15,000 and 16,000 specimens.

The very existence, however, of a Stone age is, or has lately been, denied by some eminent archæologists. Thus Mr. Wright, the learned Secretary of the Ethnological Society, while admitting that "there may have been a period