"This ancient romance shows very clearly that at the time when it was composed, neither arrows, nor other weapons of stone were in common use as weapons, but _that even then_ the opinion was _generally current_ that these stone weapons, which owed their existence to the dwarf race skilled in sorcery, were endowed with a magic power against witches and witchcraft which no other weapons possessed."--Professor Nillson, "Stone Age," p. 199. But this suggests the further reflection, whether this stone age among certain tribes was not as much in rejection as in ignorance of metals. Professor Nillson (p. 97, 98) shows that flint was used for _sacred_ sacrificial purposes by the Jews, Egyptians, Phoenicians, and Latins, long after they were acquainted with weapons of metal. Among these the traditional idea about flint, whatever it was, was kept in due subordination; but among tribes that had sunk into savagery it is conceivable that it may have become a superstition, and dominated. I am not sure that we do not underrate the capacity for tradition among savages where it has once taken hold; still, if it had been a question of mere savages, at the first glance I should have been disposed to agree with Sir John Lubbock. But let us take the case of Tasman, which Sir John puts forward as a sort of crucial case, and which may be accepted as such, seeing that the New Zealanders may fairly claim to be regarded as "barbarians."[249] [249] _Vide_ Sir George Grey's "Polynesian Mythology," p. xiii.; F. A. Weld's (Governor of Western Australia) "Notes on New Zealand," pp. 15, 60. In the first place, I find the following in a note to "Cook's Voyages" (Smith, 1846):--"Mr Polack, in his 'Narrative of Travels and Adventures during a residence in New Zealand between the years 1831-37,' collected all the particulars relating to Cook's brush with the natives, 1769, on the spot." Next, let us see what Cook says on the subject of Tasman ("Cook's Voyages," i. 164)-- "But the Indians still continued _near the ship_, rowing round many times [hardly the most favourable conditions under which to recover a tradition], conversing with Tupia [the Otaheitan interpreter] chiefly concerning the traditions they had among them with respect to the antiquities of their country. To this subject they were led by the inquiries which Tupia had been directed to make, whether they had ever seen such a vessel as ours, or had ever heard that any such had been on their coast. These inquiries were all answered in the negative, _so that_ tradition has preserved among them no memorial of Tasman, though by an observation made this day we find we are _only fifteen_ miles south of Murderers' Bay!" Evidently the shrewd and gallant investigator himself was not satisfied with the cross-examination, for we find at p. 170--