it certain that such articles are wholly absent, although unknown to the present inhabitants. It is, however, possible that some of the many customs and beliefs common to America and Asia may have been conveyed by the Pacific route, whilst the arts of metallurgy and pottery may have travelled across the Atlantic, giving rise to those numerous coincidences which are found to exist between the religious myths and rites of sepulture in pre-historic Europe, Africa, and America; nevertheless, it must not be forgotten that it is in Peru, on the Pacific coast, that the pottery, as well as the religion and architecture, bears the stronger resemblance to that of the older pre-historic empires of Egypt, Western Asia, Asia Minor, and Etruria, whilst in many other respects the affinity is great with China. Into this great and intricate problem I cannot now enter, but I believe that further investigations will eventually prove that in long bygone ages, as at the present day, there was a constant surging to and fro of peoples, sometimes by accidental migration, sometimes driven onward by enemies of a ruder race, yet always carrying with them from land to land fresh germs of thought, to be planted in new soil, to bring forth plants differing from those from which they originally sprang, although still bearing a family likeness to the parent stem.

I have not here touched upon those points of resemblance so ably discussed by Dr. Tylor, Sir John Lubbock, Dr. Wilson, and others, my object being solely to bring forward those minor details which have not excited so much attention, but which yet seem to me to add much to the weight of evidence proving a pre-historic connection between the two hemispheres. Of two or three of these I purpose treating in subsequent chapters, but would here add a few remarks by Mr. William Dall in his most interesting and instructive article upon "Masks, Labrets, and certain Aboriginal Customs, with an inquiry into the bearing of their Geographical Distribution," contributed to the Third Annual Report of the Bureau of Ethnology (Smithsonian Institution, Washington).

"There can be no doubt," says Mr. Dall, "that

America was populated in some way by people of an extremely low grade of culture at a period even geologically remote. There is no reason for supposing, however, that immigration ceased with these original people. Analogy would suggest that from time to time accessions were received from other regions, of people who had risen somewhat in the scale elsewhere, while the inchoate American population had been doing the same thing on their own ground. Be this as it may, we find certain remarkable customs or characteristics geographically spread north and south, along the western slope of the Continent, in a natural line of migration, with overflows eastward in convenient localities. These are not primitive customs, but things which appertain to a point considerably above the lowest scale of development in culture." Mr. Dall then goes on to speak of customs and myths, adding "If these were of natural American growth, stages in development out of a uniform state of culture, it might fairly be expected that we should find them either sporadically distributed without order or relation, as between family and family, wherever a certain stage of culture had been reached, or distributed in certain families, wherever their branches were to be found. This we do not find.

The only alternative which occurs to me is that these features have been impressed upon the American aboriginal world from without. If so, from whence?" Dismissing Northern Asia and Europe as giving no help in the matter, Mr. Dall turns to Polynesia and Melanesia, pointing out that from the last of the chain of islands stretching across the Pacific, it is but a step_comparatively, swept by the northerly current, to the Peruvian coast. "We observe also that these islands lie south from the westerly south-equatorial current, in the slack water between it and an easterly current, and in a region of winds blowing towards the east." He then goes on to say, "The instances, &c. I have called attention to are particularly the use of masks and carvings to a more than ordinary degree, labretifery, human head preserving, identity of myths .

"In Melanesia we find carved figures of a peculiar sort used in religious rites, or with a religious significance, and strangely enough, two or more figures in a peculiar and unaccustomed attitude, especially devoted to these purposes. Again, in Central America and Mexico we meet the same attitude, and again on the rattle in the hand of the shaman on the north-west coast, and in the carvings on his head-dress, and by his door."

He then goes on to point out a variety of customs and myths in the South Seas, similar to those in America, and, whilst deprecating any idea of a common origin, says "But from my point of view, these influences have been impressed upon people already developed to a certain, not very low degree of culture.

"Of course this influence has not been exerted without contact. My own hypothesis is that it was an incursion from Melanesia, via south-eastern Polynesia, which produced the impact, perhaps more than one. In all probability too, it occurred before either Melanesian, Polynesian, or American had acquired his present state of culture, or his present geographical distribution."

'The impulse communicated at one point might be ages in spreading, when it would probably be generally diffused in all directions; or more rapidly, when it would probably follow the lines of least resistance and most rapid intercommunication.

"The mathematical probability of such an interwoven chain of custom and belief being sporadic and fortuitous, is so nearly infinitesimal as to lay the burden of proof upon the upholders of the latter proposition . . .

"It has to me the appearance of an impulse communicated by the gradual incursion of a vigorous, masterful people upon a region already partly peopled

1 The figures here referred to consist of a man holding a frog or lizard, the tongue of the reptile being attached to that of the man, as though the latter was receiving inspiration, or some special endowment from his totem; and in addition to the places named by Mr. Dall, in which this peculiar figure is found, New Zealand may be cited, as it frequently appears in the elaborate woodcarvings of the Maories.

by weaker and receptive races, whose branches, away from the scene of progressive disturbance, remained unaffected by the characteristics resulting from the impact of the invader upon their relatives."

The contact suggested to Mr. Dall by the woodcarvings described, is further emphasized by the similarity of the tools and ornaments in shell, both ancient and modern, found in the South Sea Islands and America. In America, as in the South Seas, shell has been used from the earliest times, not only to make beads and ornaments, but also to supplement stone in the manufacture of implements, one especial shell being so much prized for this purpose as to have been carried for hundreds of miles inland, evidently forming a great article of commerce. Gorgets most elaborately carved have been found in some of the American mounds, and the design on some of these is almost identical with that painted on the great drums in use in Japanese temples, whilst the beads known as wampum, which formed both the money and historical records of the American Indians, are still made and used for similar purposes in many of the island groups of the Pacific.

CHAPTER XIII.

SURGERY AND SUPERSTITION IN NEOLITHIC TIMES.1

Trephined Skulls in Peru and Illinois-Discovery of M. Prunières-Supposed Drinking-cup-Dr. Broca's Explanation— His Theories-Surgical Operation for Epilepsy-Posthumous Trephining to provide Amulets - Operation chiefly on Children-Performed by grating away the Substance with Flint Implement-Process described by Taxil (1603)—Incomplete Trephining-Object, to facilitate Escape of Evil Spirit-Amulets from Trephined Skulls-Rondelles found in Trephined Skulls-All French Trephined Skulls belong to Neolithic Times-None known in Britain-Extension to Mediæval Times-Still in use in Algeria and PolynesiaAlgerian Mode resembles that of Ancient Peru-Belief in Efficacy of Operation-Victor Horseley's Theory-Dr. Robert Fletcher on Pre-historic Trephining.

I REFERRED in the previous chapter to the discovery of trepanned or trephined skulls in Peru, and also in Illinois, as well as of one in which the operation appears to have been incomplete, and I cited the late Dr. Broca as an authority on this most singular and interesting pre-historic surgical operation. It is indeed. to Dr. Broca that we are indebted for a theory which appears to give a reasonable explanation of the origin of a custom so apparently barbarous, and the geographical distribution of which is of great ethnological and anthropological importance.

It would appear that in 1868 M. Prunières discovered in a fine dolmen which he explored near Aiguières, a human skull, from which a large portion had been removed, apparently by means of a flint saw. This hole M. Prunières looked upon as having been made in 1 Journal of Anthropological Institute, May 1888.