The aboriginal man was influenced by what he saw and heard in the world of nature surrounding him. His religion, folk-lore, daily life, and his entire being, were affected, modified, or directed by the primitive world,—that world of the forest, the plain, the air, and the waters. To study him aright we must cast aside our modern civilization, and if possible—and that is very difficult—place ourselves in his world. The Indian of to-day is not in that world. He hears his grandparents speak of the “buffalo days,” and that conveys some meaning to his mind. But he cannot go beyond the buffalo days; he knows nothing of the more interesting times preceding. He can tell you about the folk-lore of his tribe, yet he has no tradition of the first Spaniards, whether De Soto or Coronado, or others. Notwithstanding that these Spaniards traversed many Indian lands, and bore in their hands unheard-of weapons which made smoke and noise, and killed at a distance; that they were clad in iron suits, and were riding horses,—one hears little or nothing about it. Such scenes must have impressed Indians who had never beheld the like before, and one would imagine that there would be traditions handed down regarding these miraculous strangers, yet one reads in vain for any folk-lore relating to the coming of the Spaniards. This has always appeared to me as one of the arguments against the trustworthiness of folk-lore in matters of evidence as compared with that of archæology. When one considers the subject in its broad aspect, one must admit that our knowledge of prehistoric times has not advanced in the same ratio as has our knowledge of the Indians of the historic period. The tribes themselves show marked contrasts to-day, and in the past the differences in culture may have been even more striking. It is, therefore, quite likely that an implement used for a certain purpose by one tribe may have been made use of by another tribe for a totally different purpose. [Illustration: FIG. 4. (S. unknown.) Probable manner of hafting the single-pointed and the two-pointed chisels or picks, used in quarrying flint—in digging the pits. Figs. 4 to 12, and Figs. 36 to 40, are from the 15th _Annual Report_, Bureau of Ethnology. ]