The Gruanches were doomed never to reach the age of metal. Their civilisation corresponded with that of the Chinese in the days of Fo-hi. [Footnote: Abel Rémusat tells us that of the two hundred primitive Chinese 'hieroglyphs' none showed a knowledge of metal.] The chief weapons were small triangles of close-grained basalt and _iztli_ (obsidian flakes) for _tabonas,_ or knives, both being without handles. They carried rude clubs and _banot,_ or barbed spears of pine-wood with fire-charred points. The _garrotes_ (pikes) had heads like two flattened semicircles, a shape preserved amongst negroes to the present day. Our old author tells us that the people would 'leap from rock to rock, sometimes making ten Fathoms deep at one Leap, in this manner: First they _tertiate_ their Lances, which are about the bigness of a Half-Pike, and aim with the Point at any piece of a Rock upon which they intend to light, sometimes not half a Foot broad; in leaping off they clap their Feet close to the Lance, and so carry their bodies in the Air: the Point of the Lance comes first to the place, which breaks the force of their fall; then they slide gently down by the Staff and pitch with their Feet on the very place they first design'd; and so from Rock to Rock till they come to the bottom: but their Novices sometimes break their necks in the learning.' I observed more civilisation in articles from the other islands, especially from the eastern, nearer the African continent. In 1834 Fuerteventura yielded, from a depth of six feet, a dwarfish image of a woman with prominent bosom and dressed in the native way: it appeared almost Chinese. A pot of black clay from Palmas showed superior construction. Here, too, in 1762 a cavern produced a basalt plate, upon which are circular scrawls, which support the assertions of old writers as regards the islanders not being wholly ignorant of letters. I could trace no similarity to the peculiar Berber characters, and held them to be mere ornamentation. The so-called 'Seals of the Kings' were dark stones, probably used for painting the skin; they bore parallelograms enclosed within one another, diaper-work and gridirons of raised lines. In fact, the Guanches of Tenerife were unalphabetic.