The Writings of Henry D. Thoreau
Thoreau’s references to arrowheads and other Indian relics his Journal, 1837-1861
To compile this resource, I searched the index of Journal 1 for arrow, implement, Indian, and relic, and electronic versions of the rest of the Journal for the following words: arrow, gouge, hatchet, hoe, implement, mortar, ornament, pestle, pottery, relic, soap stone, soap-stone, soapstone, spear, and tomahawk.
To locate Thoreau’s accounts of finding relics, search for *; accounts are boldfaced.
Beth Witherell, 4/2/11
Journal 1 (10/22/37 to after 1/7/44)
1837
1 10/29/37, J1, pp. 8-9
The Arrowhead.
A curious incident happened some four or six weeks
ago which I think it worth the while to record. John
and I had been searching for Indian relics, and been
successful enough to find two arrowheads and a pestle,
when, of a Sunday evening, with our heads full of the
past and its remains, we strolled to the mouth of Swamp-bridge brook. As we neared the brow of the hill forming
the bank of the river, inspired by my theme, I
broke forth into an extravagant eulogy on those savage
times, using most violent gesticulations by way of illustration.
"There on Nawshawtuct," said I, "was their
lodge, the rendezvous of the tribe, and yonder, on Clamshell
hill their feasting ground. This was no doubt a
favorite haunt; here on this brow was an eligible look-out
post. How often have they stood on this very spot,
at this very hour, when the sun was sinking behind
yonder woods, and gilding with his last rays the waters
of the Musketaquid, and pondered the day's success
and the morrow's prospects, or communed with the
spirits of their fathers gone before them to the land
of shades!-- -- "Here," I exclaimed, "stood Tahatawan; and there,
(to complete the period,) is Tahatawan's arrowhead"
We instantly proceeded to sit down on the spot I had
pointed to, and I, to carry out the joke, to lay bare an
ordinary stone, which my whim had selected, when lo!
*the first I laid hands on, the grubbing stone that was to
be, proved a most perfect arrowhead, as sharp as if just
from the hands of the Indian fabricator!!!
1842
2 3/19/42
When I walk in the fields of
Concord and meditate on the destiny of this prosperous
slip of the Saxon family--the unexhausted energies of
this new country--I forget that this which is now Concord
was once Musketaquid and that the American
race has had its destiny also. Everywhere in the fields--
in the corn and grain land--the earth is strewn with the
relics of a race which has vanished as completely as if
trodden in with the earth.
I find it good to remember
the eternity behind one as well as the eternity before.
Wherever I go, I tread in the tracks of the Indian-- I
pick up the bolt which he has but just dropped at my
feet. And if I consider destiny I am on his trail. I scatter
his hearthstones with my feet, and pick out of the
embers of his fire the simple but enduring implements
of the wigwam and the chase-- In planting my corn in
the same furrow which yielded its increase to his support
so long--I displace some memorial of him.
I have been walking this afternoon over a pleasant
field planted with winter rye--near the house. Where this
strange people once had their dwelling-place. Another
species of mortal men but little less wild to me than the
musquash they hunted-- Strange spirits--daemons--whose
eyes could never meet mine. With another nature--and
another fate than mine-- The crows flew over the edge
of the woods, and wheeling over my head seemed to
rebuke--as dark winged spirits more akin to the Indian
than I. Perhaps only the present disguise of the Indian--
If the new has a meaning so has the old.
Nature has her russet hues as well as green-- Indeed
our eye splits on every object, and we can as well take
one path as the other-- If I consider its history it is old--
if its destiny it is new-- I may see a part of an object
or the whole-- I will not be imposed on and think nature
is old, because the season is advanced I will study
the botany of the mosses and fungi on the decayed--and
remember that decayed wood is not old,
but has just begun to be what it is. I need not think of
the pine almond or the acorn and sapling when I meet
the fallen pine or oak--more than of the generations
of pines and oaks which have fed the young tree.
The new blade of the corn--the third leaf of the melon--these
are not green but gray with time, but sere in respect
of time.
The pines and the crows are not changed but instead
that Philip and Paugus stand on the plain--here are
Webster and Crockett. Instead of the council-house
is the legislature.
What a new aspect have new eyes
given to the land. Where is this country but in the
hearts of its inhabitants? why, there is only so much
of Indian America left--as there is of the American Indian
in the character of this generation.
Journal 2 (Fall 1842 to Spring 1848)
(based on a search of an electronic version. Many entries in Journal 2 are undated, and many entries from pp. 3-95 were copied from the MS volumes in Journal 1, for use in Thoreau’s first book, A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers [1849]. I’ve given page numbers in Journal 2 as well as dates.)
1842-1844
3 J2, p. 3
These Indian relics in our fields which have preserved
their rugged forms so long are evidence of the vital
energy of the people who made them.
4 J2, pp. 38-40
Everywhere in our corn and grain fields the earth is
strewn with the relics of a race, which has vanished as
completely as if trodden in with the earth-- When I
meditate on the destiny of this prosperous branch of the
Saxon family, and the unexhausted energies of this new
country--I forget that what is now Concord was once
Musketaquid, And that the American race has had its
history-- The future reader of history will associate this
generation with the red man in his thoughts, and give it
credit for some sympathy with that race-- Our history
will have some copper tints at least and be read as through
an Indian summer haze-- But such were not our
reflections
But the Indian is absolutely forgotten but by some
persevering poets. By an evident fate the White man has
commenced a new era. What do our anniversaries
commemorate but white men's exploits? For Indian deeds
there must be an Indian memory--the white man will
remember his own only-- We have forgotten their hostility
as well as friendship. Who can realize that within the
memory of this generation in our last war--the remnant
of an ancient and dusky race of warriors the stockbridge
Indians within the limits of this very state--furnished a
company for the war--on condition only that they should
not be expected to fight white man's fashion--or to
train--but Indian fashion still-- And occasionally their
wigwams are seen on the banks of this very stream still,
like the cabins of the muskrats in the meadow.
They seem like a race who have exhausted the secrets
of nature--tanned with age--while this young and still
fair saxon race--on whom the sun has not long shined,
is but commencing its career.
Wherever I go I am still on the trail of the Indian.-- The
light and sandy soils which the first settlers cultivated
were the Indian corn fields--and with every fresh
ploughing their surface is strewn with the relics of their
race--
Arrow heads--spear heads tomahawks, axes--gouges
--pestles--mortars--hoes pipes of soap-stone, ornaments
for the neck and breast--and other implements of war
and of the chace attract the transient curiosity of the
farmer-- We have some hundreds which we have
ourselves collected.
And one is as surely guided in this search by the
locality and nature of the soil as to the berries in
autumn-- Unlike the modern farmer they selected the
light and sandy plains and rising grounds near to ponds
and streams of water-- --which the squaws could easily
cultivate with their stone hoes. And where these fields
have been harrowed and rolled for grain in the fall--their
surface yields its annual crop arrow heads and other
relics as of grain.-- And the burnt stones on which their
fires were built are seen dispersed by the plow on every
hand.
Their memory is in harmony with the russet hue of
the fall of the year
Instead of Philip and Paugus on the plains here are
Webster & Crockett. Instead of the council house is the
legislature.
5 J2, pp. 56-57
We learned afterward that we had pitched our camp
upon the very spot which a few summers before had been
ocupied by a roving party of Penobscots.-- as if we had
been led by an Indian instinct. We could see rising a few
miles before us a dark conical eminence--called Hooksett
pinnacle a landmark--for boatmen.
6 J2, pp. 58-60
Among others I have picked up a curious spherical
stone--probably an implement of war--like a small paving
stone--about the size of a goose egg--with a groove worn
quite round it--by which it was probably fastened to a
thong or a withe--and answered to strike a severe blow
like a shotted colt.
I have since seen larger ones of the same description
The arrow heads are of every color and of various
forms--and materials--though they are commonly made of
a stone which has a conchoidal fracture. Many small ones
are found made of white quartz which are simple
equilateral triangles--with one side slightly convex.
-- These were probably small shot for birds and
squirrels. Where the arrow heads are found the chips
which were made in manufacturing them are much more
numerous-- Wherever a lodge stood for any length of
time. And these silvers are the surest indication of Indian
ground--since the geologists tell us that this stone is not
to be found in this vicinity.
The spear heads are of the same form and material
only larger.
Some are found as perfect and sharp as ever for time
has not the effect of blunting this stone And when it
breaks it has a ragged edge which makes a worse cut
than steel-- Yet they are so brittle that they can hardly
be carried in the pocket without being broken.
It is a matter of astonishment how the Indians ever
made them with no iron or steel tools to work with-- And
I doubt whether one of our merchants with all the aids
of Yankee ingenuity could soon learn to copy one of the
thousands under our feet. It is well known that the art of
making flints which is best understood in Germany is
only acquired after long practice and then requires
some unusual knack in the operator they being struck out
with a hardened steel chisel--but the arrow-head is of
much more irregular form, and like the flint such is the
nature of the stone, must be struck out by skilful
blows-- A blow of a hammer cracks them into a hundred
pieces.
An Indian to whom I exhibited some--but who like
myself regarded them only as relics of antiquity--suggested
that as white man has one blacksmith who did all the
work for many families-- So Indian had one arrow head
maker-- But the number of chips (or to keep up the
analogy--the cinder heaps) imply too much forges--and
that there must have been as many artists, unless like
the cobblers of old times, the Indian blacksmith0--went
round from wigwam to wigwam--and supplied the wants
of the warrior.
I have seen some from the south seas which were
precisely similar-- So necessary--so little whimsical--and
so important in the history of the human race is this
little tool.
So has the steel hatchet its prototype in the stone one
of the Indian--and the stone hatchet--in the necessities of
man.
Venerable are these ancient arts whose early history is
lost in that of the race itself.
Here too is the pestle and mortar these--ancient forms
and symbols older than the plow or the spade.
The invention of that plow which now turns them up
to the surface marks the era of their burial.
An era which can never have its history--which is
older than the invention of history.
These are relics of an era older than--modern
civilization--compared with which--Greece and Rome--and
Egypt are modern. And the savage retreats and the white
man advances.
I have the following account of some relics in my
possession which were brought from Taunton in Bristol
County. Many a field which had been planted with corn
for many years The sod being broken the wind began to
blow away the soil and then the sand--for several years
until at length it was blown away to the depth of several
feet--where it ceased-- And the ground appeared strewed
with the remains of an Indian village--with regular
circles of stones which formed the foundation of their
wigwams--and numerous implements beside.
[In spring 1838 Thoreau’s brother John sent a box of relics from Taunton, MA, where he was teaching; the pertinent part of Thoreau’s letter in response follows:
Concord, March 17th 1838
Dear John,
Your box of relics came safe to hand, but was speedily deposited on the carpet I assure you. What could it be? Some declared it must be Taunton herrings Just nose it sir. So down we went onto our knees and commenced smelling in good earnest, now horizontally from this corner to that, now perpendicularly from the carpet up, now diagonally, and finally with a sweeping movement describing the entire circumference. But it availed not. Taunton herring would not be smelled. So we e’en proceded to open it vi et chisel. What an array of nails! Four nails make a quarter four quarters a yard,--i faith this is’nt cloth measure. Blow away old boy, clap in another wedge, there!--there! softly she begins to gape-- Just give that old stickler with a black hat on a hoist Aye! he’ll pare his nails for him. Well done old fellow there’s a breathing hole for you “Drive it in,” cries one, “rip it off,” cries another. Be easy I say. What’s done, may be undone Your richest veins don’t lie nearest the surface. Suppose we sit down and enjoy the prospect, for who knows but we may be disappointed? When they opened Pandora’s box, all the contents escaped except hope, but in this case hope is uppermost and will be the first to escape when the box is opened. However the general voice was for kicking the cover-lid off.
The relics have been arranged numerically on a table. When shall we set up housekeeping? Miss Ward thanks you for her share of the spoils, also acept many thanks from your humble servant “for yourself”.]
1845
J2, pp. 156-157
7 7/7/45
I am glad to remember tonight as I sit by my door that
I too am at least a remote descendent of that heroic race
of men of whom there is tradition. I too sit here on the
shore of my Ithaca, a fellow wanderer and survivor of
Ulysses. How Symbolical, significant of I know not what
the pitch pine stands here before my door unlike any
glyph I have seen sculptured or painted yet-- One of
nature's later designs. Yet perfect as her Grecian art.
There it is, a done tree. Who can mend it? And
where is the generation of heroes whose lives are to pass
amid these our northern pines? Whose exploits shall
appear to posterity pictured amid these strong and
shaggy forms?
Shall there be only arrows and bows to go with these
pines on some pipe stone quarry at length.
1845-1846
8 J2, p. 130
Before yet any woodchuck or squirrel has run across the
road--or the sun has got round the corner of the wood
(world) While all the dew was on. My hoe began to
tinkle against the stones of my bean-field-- I heard from
time to time of oratorio's concerts operas in distant
temples but attended none of them--but this was my
oratorio when my steel hoe plate struck against a
pebble--and vibrated some chord of nature--ah it has
dignified the bean grower's live this divine accompaniment
yielding an instant crop-- As I hoed and gathered still
fresher soil about my rows--I disturbed the ashes of
unrecorded nations--whose primeval lives were passed
under these same heavens, and their small implements of
war and hunting and perhaps more ancient hoes--were
brought to the light of this modern day.
1846
September 1846--first trip to Maine
9 J2, p. 290
After dinner we strolled down to the "point--or the
junction of the two rivers--said to be the scene of an
ancient battle between the Eastern Ind. & the Mohawks
and a place still much used by Ind bound up or down the
river for camping. *We grubbed in a small potatoe patch
and found some points of arrowheads and on the shore
some colored beads and one small leaden bullet--but
nothing more remarkable.
10 J2, p. 298
Geo. Mc Causlin has a clearing of several hundred
acres of level intervale at the mouth of the little Schoodic
river a dark and swampy looking beaver-stream This
soil bore the evidence of having been occupied by the
Ind Mc C. having picked up many relics and we looked
for more this afternoon though with slight success
Journal 3 (summer 1848 through 8/20/51)
(based on a search of an electronic version)
1849
11 J3, p. 34
[Between 10/15 and 10/28/49] [T’s first trip to Cape Cod was October 9-15, 1849]
(We saw no savages but we were informed by a very old white man that he could remember when there were a few in this neighborhood, and on the high bank in Truro, looking for traces of them *we picked up an Indian's arrowhead.)
1850
12 J3, p. 56
[Between 4/19 and 4/26/1850]
I visited today an old mill on the shawshine in Bedford said by Shattuck to have been built before Philip's war & to have been owned by Michael Bacon then--& garrisoned by two soldiers at his request--now owned by a Fitch. Fitch the miller son of owner said the original mill had been burnt a great may years ago--but showed us a wall which he thought was as old as the first & many old oak timbers much decayed. His Grandmother there had been a mill there 200 years-- I was most struck by some stairs made of sollid oak timber sawed diagonally the hypothenuse resting on a straight backed oak horse-- The miller thought them a hundred years old at least-- They commanded my respect. old times had stout men. There was an old oak block shaped somewhat like a chair & used as such--its use not now known.-- Also something like a solid wheel barrow wheel of oak, use not known, now
{One-fourth page blank}
used to turn logs on. In a pleasant rocky part of the Shawshine.
Ind corn hills many places are pointed out where the Ind cultivated corn--??
*I found today lying close together as in the hand about a dozen chips of arrow heads & among them one imperfect arrow head about a foot below the surface where an Ind. had sat to make them once--the perfect ones of course were carried off. It was close to the burnt stone's & ashes of an Ind. Lodge. I think that the Ind. cultivated only the very light & sandy soil It frequently happens that where there is at present a desert & the farmers go for sand you will the traces of their wigwams & chip of arrowhead stone & arrowheads--
The oldest monuments of the white settlers hereabouts are probably some dilapited & now undistinguished stone walls--laid long before Philip's war--not houses certainly perhaps not cellars--but old unhonored stone walls & ditches-- But it is difficult to find one well authenticated. I respect a stone wall therefore.
13 J3, p. 91
[Between 7/1 and 7/16/1850]
Sometimes an arrow-head is found with the mouldering shaft still attached-- V. Ch. Hubbard. A little boy from Compton R.I. told me that his father found an arrowhead sticking in a dead tree & nearly buried in it Where is the hand that drew that bow? The arrow shot by the Indian is still found occasionally sticking in the trees of our forest.
[“Ch. Hubbard” may be Charles Hubbard, a Concord farmer.]
14 11/16/50
Nov 16th
I found 3 good arrowheads to-day behind Dennises. The season for them began some time ago as soon as the farmers had sown their winter rye--but the spring after the melting of the snow is still better.
1851
15 2/13/51, J3, p. 191
Again I saw today half a mile off in Sudbury a sandy spot on the top of a hill--where I prophesied that I should find traces of the Indians. When within a dozen rods I distinguished the foundation of a lodge--and *merely passing over it I saw many fragments of the arrowhead stone-- I have frequently distinguished these localities half a mile--gone forward & picked up arrowheads. Examined by the botany All its parts--the first flower I have seen, the ictodes foetidum
Saw in a warm muddy brook in Sudbury--quite open & exposed the skunk cabbage spathes above water-- The tops of the spathes were frostbitten but the fruit sound-- There was one partly expanded-- The first flower of the season--for it is a flower-- I doubt if there is month without its flower.
Also mosses--mingled red & green--the red will pass for the blossom.
As for antiquities-- One of our old deserted country roads marked only by the parallel fences & a cellar hole with its bricks where the last inhabitant died the victim of intemperance 50 years ago with its bare & exhausted fields stretching around-- suggests to me an antiquity greater & more remote from America than the tombs of Etruria.-- I insert the rise & fall of Rome in that parenthesis.
16 5/23/51
Distantly related things are strangely near in fact Perchance this window seat in which we sit discoursing Transcendentalism--with only Germany & Greece--stretching behind our minds--was made so deep because this was a few years ago a garrison house--with thick log walls bullet proof--behind which men sat to escape the wild red man's bullet. & the arrow & the Tomahawk. & bullets fired by Indians are now buried in its walls. Pythagoras seems near compared with them.
17 7/30/51
[trip to Clark’s Island and Plymouth]
The house here stands within a grove of balm of gileads-- horse-chestnuts--cherries apples & plums--&c Uncle bill who lives in his schooner--not turned up Numidian fashion but anchored in the mud--whom I meant to call on yesterday morn--lo! had run over to “The Pines” last evening--fearing an easterly storm. He out rode the great gale in the spring alone in the harbor dashing about-- He goes after rockweed--lighters vessels & saves wrecks-- Now I see him lying in the mud over at the Pines in the horizon. which place he cannot leave if he will till flood tide--but he will not it seems. This waiting for the tide is a singular feature in the life by the shore. In leaving your boat today you must always have reference to what you are going to do the next day. A frequent answer is “Well, you cant start for two hours yet.” It is something new to a landsman--& at first he is not disposed to wait. I saw some heaps of shells left by the Indians near the N end of the Island. They were a rod in diameter & a foot or more high in the middle--& covered with a shorter & greener grass than the surrounding field. found one imperfect arrowhead. At 10 AM sailed to Websters--past Powder point in Duxbury--we could see his land from the island. I was steersman and learned the meaning of some nautical phrases--“luff” to keep the boat close to the wind till the sails begin to flap. ”bear-away” to put the sail more at right angles with the wind. A “close-haul” when the sails are brought & belayed nearly or quite in a line with the vessel.
18 7/31/51
Pilgrim Hall-- They used to crack off pieces of the Forefathers Rock for visitors with a cold chisel till the town forebade it. The stone remaining at wharf is about 7 ft square. Saw 2 old arm chairs that came over in the May flower.-- the large picture by Sargent.-- Standish's sword.-- gun barrel with which Philip was killed-- --mug & pocket-book of Clark the mate-- Iron pot of Standish.-- Old pipe tongs. Ind relics a flayer a pot or mortar of a kind of fire proof stone very hard-- only 7 or 8 inches long. A Commission from Cromwell to Winslow?-- his signature torn off. They talk of a monument on the rock. The burying hill 165 ft high. Manomet 394 ft high by state map. Saw more pears at Washburn's garden. No graves of Pilgrims.
Journal 4 (8/21/51 through 4/27/52)
(based on a search of an electronic version)
19 9/28/51, J4, p. 110
*I picked up two arrow-heads in the field beyond.
20 10/8/51, J4, pp. 132-134
This day is very warm--yet not bright like the last, but hazy. *Picked up an Ind. gouge on Dennis’ Hill. The foliage has lost its very bright tints now--it is more dull--looks dry or as if burnt even-- The very ground or grass is crisped with drought--and yields a crispy sound to my feet. The woods are brownish-- reddish--yellowish merely--excepting of course the evergreens. It is so warm that I am obliged to take off my neck-handkerchief & laborers complain of the heat.
. . .
The puff balls are split open & rayed out on the sand like 5 or 10! fingers The milk weed seeds must be carried far for it is only when a strong wind is blowing that they are loosened from their pods. *An arrowhead at the desert. Spergula Arvensis--Corn- Spurrey (some call it tares) at the acorn tree-- Filled my pockets with acorns. *Found another gouge on Dennis’ Hill. To have found two Ind. gouges and tasted sweet acorns--is it not enough for one afternoon?
1852
21 4/2/52, J4, p. 416
What ails the Pewee’s tail?-- It is loosely hung.-- pulsating with life. What mean these wag tail birds? Cats & dogs too express some of their life through their tails. The bridges are a station at this season-- They are the most advantageous positions. There I would take up my stand morning & evening looking over the water. The Charles Miles run full & rumbling-- The water is the color of ale--here dark red ale over the yellow sand--there yellowish frothy ale where it tumbles down-- Its foam composed of large white bubbles makes a kind of arch over the rill snow white & contrasting with the general color of the stream--while the latter ever runs under it carrying the lower bubbles with it & new ones ever supply their places-- at least 18 inches high this stationary arch. I do not remember elsewhere such highly colored water. It drains a swamp near by & is dry the greater part of the year. Coarse bubbles continually bursting--a striped snake by the spring--& a black one. The grass there is delightfully green--while there is no fresh green anywhere else to be seen-- It is the most refreshing of all colors-- It is what all the meadows will soon be. The color of no flower is so grateful to the eye. Why is the dog black & the grass green? If all the banks were suddenly painted green & spotted with yellow white red--blue purple &c we should more fully realize the miracle of the summer’s coloring-- Now the snow is off it is pleasant to visit the sandy bean fields covered with last years blue curls & sorrel & the flakes of arrowhead stone-- I love these sandy fields which melt the snows & yield but small crops to the farmer.--
. . .
p. 422
We land in a steady rain & walked inland by R Rice’s barn regardless of the storm toward White Pond. Overtaken by an Irishman in search of work. Discovered some new oaks & pine groves and more New Eng. fields. At last the drops fall wider apart--& we pause in a sandy field near the Great Road of the corner where it was agreeably retired & sandy--drinking up the rain-- The rain was soothing--so still & sober--gently beating against & amusing our thoughts--swelling the brooks-- The robin now peeps with scared note in the heavy overcast air--among the apple trees-- The hour is favorable to thought-- Such a day I like a sandy road-- Snows that melt & leave bear the corn & grain fields--with Indian relics shining on them & prepare the ground for the farmer--
22 4/19/52, J4, p. 471
The thing that pleases me most within these three days is the discovery of the andromeda phenomenon-- It makes all those parts of the country where it grows more attractive & elysian to me. It is a natural magic. These little leaves are the stained windows in the cathedral of my world. At sight of any redness I am excited like a cow.-- *To-day you can find arrowheads for every stone is washed bright in the rain.
23 4/21/52, p. 479
Sat under the dark hemlocks--gloomy hemlocks on the hill-side beyond. In a stormy day like this there is the gloom of night beneath them. The ground beneath them almost bare with wet rocks & fine twigs--without leaves (but hemlock leaves) or grass. The birds are singing in the rain about the small pond in front-- The inquisitive chicadee that has flown at once to the alders to reconnoitre as the black birds--the song-sparrow telling of expanding buds. But above all the robin sings here too-- I know not at what distance in the wood. Did he sing thus in Indian days?, I ask myself--for I have always associated this sound with the village & the clearing, but now I do detect the aboriginal wildness in his strain--& can imagine him a woodland bird--and that he sang thus when there was no civilized ear to hear him--a pure forest melody even like the wood thrush. Every genuine thing retains this wild tone--which no true culture displaces-- I heard him even as he might have sounded to the Indian singing at evening upon the elm above his wigwam--with which was associated in the red-man’s mind the events of an Indian’s life.-- his childhood. Formerly I had heard in it only those strains which tell of the white man’s village life--now I heard those strains which remembered the red-man’s life--such as fell on the ears of Indian children.-- as he sang when these arrow-heads which the rain has made shine so on the lean stubble field--were fastened to their shaft. Thus the birds sing round this piece of water-- some on the alders which fringe--some farther off & higher up the hills-- It is a centre to them.
Journal 5 (4/27/1852 through 3/8/1853)
(based on a search of an electronic version)
24 6/7/52, J5, p. 81
Surveying for Sam. Pierce. *Found piece
of an Indian soapstone pot.
[Pierce’s farm was in Lincoln, MA]
25 7/8/52, J5, p. 199
Yesterday I observed the arrow wood
at Saw mill brook remarkably tall straight
and slender. It is quite likely the Indians
made their arrows of it--for it makes
just such shoots as I used to select for
my own arrows--It appears to owe its straightness partly to its rapid growth already 2
feet from the extremities chiefly.
26 7/18/52, J5, p. 231
We land on the left half a
mile above Sherman's bridge--ramble
to the "sand" & poplars--where
*I picked up two arrowheads--
27 12/2/52, J5, p. 402
Left our boat just above the last named bridge on W side. A
bright dazzling sheen for miles on the river as you
looked up it. Crossed the bridge--turned into
a path on the left & ascended a hill a mile
and a half off between us & Billerica--somewhat
off from the river. The Concord affords
the water prospects of a larger river--like the Connecticut even.--hereabouts-- *I found a spear-head, by a mysterious little building. Dined
on the Hill from which we saw Billerac center
a mile and a half northerly. We had crossed
what by the map must be the brook from Nutting Pond.
1853
Journal 6 (3/9/53 through 8/18/53)
(based on a search of an electronic version)
28 1/31/53, J5, p. 461
*--Found an Ind. adze in
the Bridle-Road at the brook
just beyond Daniel Clark Jr's house.
29 3/13/53, J6, pp. 8-9
No sap flows yet from my
hole in the white maple by the bridge--*found
In the Great Fields fragment of Ind--
soapstone ware--which judging from its
thinness for a vestige of the rim remains
was a dish of the form & size of a saucer only
3 times as thick. Listening for early birds
I hear a faint tinkling sound in the leafless
woods as if a piece of glass rattled against
a stone.
30 3/24/53
I find the arrow headed character on
our plains--older than the written
character in Persia.
31 5/28/53, J6, p. 156
What is peculiar now--beginning yesterday--
after the rains--is the sudden
heat--& the more general sound
of crickets by day--and the loud
ringing croak of common toads
& tree toads--at evening & in the
night-- Our river has so little cur-
rent that when the wind has gone
down as at present it is dark &
perfectly smooth & at present dusty
as a stagnant pool in every part
of it--far from there being
any murmur--there is no
ripple nor eddy for the most
part. Hubbard has plowed up
the lowlying field at the bathing
place--and planted it with potatoes--
& now we find that the field we
resort to was equally used by the
Indians--for *their arrow heads are
now exposed by the plow.
32 6/2/53, J6, p. 174
Equicetum limosum out some days
Look for it at Myosotis brook--bottom
of Wheildon's field Side saddle flower--
purple petals(?) now begin to hang down. Arethusas
are abundant in what I may call Arethusa
meadow--they are the more striking for
growing in such green localities in meadows
where their brillant purple more or less
red--contrasts with the green grass.
*Found 4 perfect arrowheads & one imper-
fect in the potatoe field just plowed
up for the first time that I remember
at the Hubbard bathing place. Each hill
of potatoes--(they are now just out of
the ground) has been pushed by
some animal and a great many
of the potatoes planted not long
since abstracted. Some are left
on the surface. Almost every hill
in the field which bounds on the
river has been disturbed. Was it
a muskrat--or a mink--or a wodd
chuck--or a skunk--? the tracks are
of the right size for any of these.
33 6/24/53, J6, p. 241
*Found what I take to be an Indian
hoe at Hubbard bathing place sort of
slate stone 4 or 5/8 inch thick semicir-
cular--8 inches one way by 4 or more the
other--chipped down on the edges--
Journal 7 (8/19/53 through 2/12/54)
(based on a search of an electronic version)
34 9/22/53, J7, p. 97
[trip to Maine]
While the batteau was coming
over to take us from the Island--I
looked round on the shore--*saw many
fragments of arrowhead stone & picked
up one broken chisel.
35 10/26/53
I was surprised when I heard
the Indian language the other
day--it was an evidence of the existence
of an Indian race--so much
more conclusive than the arrowheads I
had found and convinced
me that the Indians were not the
invention of poets-- I heard these red
men speaking a language of which
I did not understand a syllable--as
wild & primitive & purely Indian
as ever. Hearing this brought me
startlingly near to the savage--to King
Philip--& Paugus--who would
have understood it. I sat & heard
Penobscots gossip & laugh & jest
in the language in which Elliots Indian
Bible is written-- The language
which has been spoken in New England
who shall say how long? This sound
these accents at least were as genuine
as the earliest discoverer heard-- These
were the sounds that issued from the
wigwams of this country before Columbus
was born-- With few exceptions
the language of their forefathers is still
copious enough for them.
36 11/9/53, J7, p. 152
*Landed & walked over Conants Indian rye-field & I picked
up 2 good arrowheads-- The river with its
waves has a very wild look Southward & I
see the white caps of the waves in Fair Haven
Bay-- Went into the woods by Holden swamp
& sat down to hear the wind roar amid the
tree tops-- What an incessant straining of
the trees-- It is a music that wears better
than the opera methinks-- This reminds
me how the telegraph wire hummed coarsely
in the tempest as we passed under it.
Hitherto it had only rained a little from
time to time--but now it began suddenly
in earnest-- We hastily rowed across to the
firm ground of Fair Haven Hill side--drew
up our boat & turned it over in
a twinkling--on to a clump of alders
covered with cat briars which kept up
the lee side--and crawled under it.
37 11/29/53 J7, p. 180
J. Hosmer showed me a pestle which his
son had found this summer--while plowing
on the plain bet-- his house & the river-- It
has a rude birds’ head a hawk or eagles
the beak & eyes (the latter a mere prominence) serving for a knob or handle--{drawing} -- It
is affecting as a work of art by
a people who have left so few traces
of themselves--a step beyond the common
arrowhead & pestle & axe-- Something more
fanciful--a step beyond pure utility. As
long as I find traces of works of convenience
merely however much skill they show--I
am not so much affected--as when I
discover works which evince the exercise of
fancy & taste however rude-- It is
a great step to find a pestle whose
handle is ornamented with a bird’s
head knob-- It brings the maker still
nearer to the races which so ornament their
umbrella & cane handles. I have then
evidence in stone that men lived here who
had fancies to be pleased--& in whom the first
steps toward a complete culture were taken-- It
implies so many more thoughts such
as I have-- The arrow-head too suggests a bird--but
a relation to it not in the least god-like-- But
here an Indian has patiently sat
& fashioned a stone into the likeness of a
bird--and added some pure beauty to that
pure utility--& so far has begun to leave behind
him war & even hunting--& to redeem
himself from the savage state. In this
he was leaving off to be savage--enough
of this would have saved him from
extermination.
1854
Journal 8 (2/13/54 through 9/3/54)
(based on a search of an electronic version)
38 3/12/54, J8, p. 40
Now is the season to look for Indian
relics--the sandy fields being just bared--
I stand on the high lichen covered & colored
(greenish) hill beyond Abner Buttrick's--
I go further east & look across the
meadows to Bedford--& see that peculiar
scenery of March--in which I have
taken so many rambles-- The earth
just bare & beginning to be dry--the
snow lying on the N sides of hills--
the gray deciduous trees & the green pines soughing
in the March wind--they look now as
if deserted by a companion--(the snow)
When you walk over bare lichen clad
hills--just beginning to be dry--& look afar
over the blue water on the meadows--
you are beginning to break up your
winter quarters--& plan adventures for
the new year-- The scenery is like--yet unlike
November-- You have the same barren
russet--but now instead of a dry hard
cold wind--a peculiarly soft moist air
or else a raw wind. Now is the reign
of water.
39 5/16/54, J8, p. 125
Landed at Conantum by the red-cherry grove above arrowhead
field the red cherries 6 inches in diameter
25 or 30 high in full bloom--with a reddish
smooth bark.
40 6/9/54
The summer aspect of the river begins perhaps
when the Utricularia vulgaris is first seen
on the surface--as yesterday-- As I go along
the RR causeway-- I see in the cultivated ground
a lark flashing his white tail & showing his hand-
some yellow breast--with its black crescent
like an Indian locket.
. . .
Find the Great fringed orchis
out 2 or 3 days. 2 are almost fully out--
2 or 3 only budded-- A large spike of peculiarly delicate
pale purple flowers growing in the luxuriant
& shady swamp--amid--hellebores--ferns
golden senecios &c &c. It is remarkable
that this one of the fairest of all
our flowers--should also be one of the rarest--
For the most part not seen at all
-- I think that no other but myself in Concord
annually finds it--that so queenly a flower
should annually bloom so rarely & in such
withdrawn & secret places as to be rarely
seen by man. The village belle--never sees
this more delicate belle of the swamp-- How little
relation between our life & its! Most of us
never see it or hear of it. The seasons
go by to us as if it were not-- A beauty
reared in the shade--of a convent--who
has never strayed beyond the convent bell.
Only the skunk or owl or other inhabitant
of the swamp beholds it. In the damp twilight
of the swamp--where it is wet to the feet--
How little anxious to display its attractions.
It does not pine because man does not
admire it. How independent on our race!
It lifts its delicate spike amid the hellebore
& ferns in the deep shade of the swamp--
-- I am inclined to think of it as a relic of
the past as much as the arrowhead--
*or the tomahawk I found on the 7th ult. [Thoreau refers to June 7; the Journal entry of that date makes no mention of finding a tomahawk.]
(J8, p. 184)
41 6/13/54, J8, p. 191
Stopped to pick strawberries on
Fair Haven. When I have staid out thus
till late many miles from home--& have
heard a cricket beginning to chirp louder near me
in the grass-- I have felt that I was not far
from home after all-- Began to be weaned
from my village home. There is froth on alders
which comes off onto my clothes. I see over the
bream nests little schools of countless minute
minnows can they be the young breams? The breams
being still in their nests. It is surprising how thickly
strewn our soil is with arrow heads-- I never
see the surface broken in sandy places but I
think of them-- *I find them on all sides--
not only in corn & grain & potatoe & bean fields
--but in pastures and woods--by woodchucks
holes--& pigeon beds--and as to night--
in a pasture where a restless cow had pawed
the ground. I float home-ward over water
almost perfectly smooth--yet not methinks
as in the fall--my sail so idle that I count
10 devils needles resting along it at once.
42 8/21/54
Brought home a great
Euptorium Purpureum from Miles' swamp--
(made species fistulosum by Barratt. It is 10 1/2
feet high & I inch in diameter--said to grow to 12 feet.
The corymb, 18 1/2 inches wide X 15 inches deep. The
largest leaves 13 X 3 inches. The stem hollow through-
out-- This I found to my surprise when I undertook
to make a flute of it trusting it was closed at the
leaves--but there is no more pith there than else-
where-- It would serve many purposes as a water
pipe &c Prob. the Indians knew it & used. They might
have blowed arrows through a straight one-- It would
yeild an available hollow tube 6 feet long.
(The following passages will appear in Journal 9: 1854-1855 through Journal 16: 1860-1861. I collected them by searching an electronic version of our transcripts of the manuscripts on which those volumes will be based.)
43 11/22/54 [in New York City, on the way home from lecturing in Philadelphia]
Saw at museum some large flakes
of cutting arrowhead stone made into a
sort of wide cleavers--also a hollow
stone tube prob from mounds.
[This was probably Barnum’s American Museum. It burned on July 13, 1865. The NYT account of the fire included a description of the attractions: “There was also there a very large collection of Indian curiosities -- bows, arrows, stone-heads, poisoned shafts, &c., besides one of the twenty clubs with which Capt. COOK was possibly killed.” Link from Wikipedia, “Barnum's American Museum”]
1855
44 1/7/55
The delicious soft spring-suggesting
air--how it fills my veins with life
-- Life becomes again credible to me–-
A certain dormant life awakes
in me--& I begin to love nature again.
Here is my Italy--my heaven--my New
England. I understand why the Indians
hereabouts placed heaven in the SW–-
The Soft South. On the slopes the
ground is laid bare & radical
leaves revealed--crowfoot--shep-
herds purse--clover &c a fresh green
& in the meadow the skunk cabbage
buds--with a bluish bloom--& the reddish
leaves of the meadow saxifrage & these
the many withered plants laid bare
^remind me of spring & of botany.
*On the same bare sand is revealed a
new crop of arrowheads-- I pick up
2 perfect ones of quartz, sharp as if
just from the hands of the maker.
45 2/21/55
March days. How much light there is
in the sky & on the surface of the russet
earth--! It is reflected in a flood
from all cleansed surfaces--which
rain & snow have washed--from the
rail-road rails & the mica in the rocks--
& The silvery latebrae of insects there
^& I never saw the white houses of the
Now look for an early crop of arrowheads--for they will shine
village more brightly white.
46 3/2/55
Returning over Great Fields--*found half
a dozen arrowheads--one with 3 scallops
in the base {drawing}
47 3/6/55
Since then colder--with increasing wind--& some--
clouds--with last night some rain.
The sands are too dry & light-colored to show arrow heads so well now--
I see many places where after the late freshet
the musquash made their paths under
the ice--leading from the water a rod or
the
two to a bed of grass above water level.
48 7/31/55
*[J Farmer] Found lately on his sand 2 arrow heads & close
by, a rib, & a shoulder blade & knee pan? he thinks
of an Indian.
49 9/30/55
Sep 30th Sunday-- Rode with R. to Sassa-
Cowens Pond--in the North part of
New Bedford--So called from an Indian
on the Taunton road. Called also Toby's
Pond from Jonathan Toby who lives
famous
close by--who has a^lawsuit about
a road he built to Taunton years ago
which he has not yet paid for-- In
which suit, he told us, he had spent
30000 dollars--employed Webster--
Toby Toby said the pond was called
from the last of the Indians who
100 or 150 yrs ago
lived there^--& that you can still see
his cellar hole &c on the west side
of the pond. We saw floating in
the pond the bottom of an old log-
canoe--the sides rotted off. &
some great bleached trunks of trees
washed up-- *Found two quartz arrow-
heads on the neighboring fields.
. . .
Returning we crossed the
Acushnet River where it took its rise
coming out of a swamp-- Looked
for arrow heads in a field where were
many quahog, oyster, scollop--clam--
& winkle, (pyrula) shells--prob. brought
by the Whites 4 or 5 miles from the salt
Also saw these in places which Indians had frequented
water--^Went into an old deserted
. . .
Arthur Ricketson showed me in his collection
what was ap.(?) an Indian mortar--
which had come from Lampsons in
dark
Middleborough. It was a^granite like
stone some 10 inches long by 8 wide &
4 thick with a regular round cavity
worn in it 4 inches in diameter & 1 1/2 deep
--also a smaller one opposite on the
other side
10/2/55
The arrowheads hereabouts are commonly
white quartz.
50 10/1/55
Arthur R has a soap stone pot (Indian)
about 9 inches long more than an inch thick
{drawing} with a kind of handle at the
ends.--or protuberances.
51 12/27/55
Kept Town School
a fortnight in '37 (?)-- Began the
Big Red Journal Oct '37-- Found
first arrowheads Fall of '37--. Wrote a Lecture
it before the Lyceum in the Mason's Hall--
Ap. 11th '38--
1856
52 4/14/56
I still find small turtles eggs on the surface
entire--while looking for arrowheads by
the Island.
53 5/25/56
May 25th
10 Am To Fair H. Pond with Blake & Brown--
*I found 5 arrowheads at Clam Shell
Hill.
6/24/56
There was a beech wood at the west
end--where R's son Walton found
an arrowhead when they were here before
& the hemlocks resounded with
the note of the tweezer bird--S. Americana
54 6/28/56
June 28th
Lamium amplexicaule still out behind
R's shanty-- *I picked up 2 arrow heads
amid oyster & clamshells by a rock
at the head of the creek opposite Rs.
One was of peculiar form quite blunt
& small--thus--{drawing} of quartz--
ap to knock over small game without
breaking the skin.
55 7/21/56
These hot afternoons I go panting through
the close sproutlands & copses--as now from
Cliff Brook to Wheeler Meadow--& occasionally
come to sandy places a few feet in diameter
where the partridges have dusted themselves--.
Gerard the Lion Killer of Algiers speaks
of seeing similar spots when patien tracking
& his truth in this particular is a confirmation of the rest of his story
or patiently waiting the lion--there ^ -- It is inter-
But his pursuit dwarfs this fact & makes it seem trivial. Shall ^ not my pursuit also
esting to find that the same phenomena, however
contrast with the trivialness of the partridge’s dusting?
simple, recur in different parts of the globe.
I have found an arrow head or 2 in such
places even. Far in warm sandy woods
in hot weather--when not a breath
of air is stirring. I come upon these
still sandier and warmer spots where
the partridges have dusted themselves--&
now all still a deserted
^ am not relieved--yet pleased to find
that I have been preceded by any creature.
56 8/12/56
*An arrow head in Peter’s path-- How
many times I have found an arrowhead
by that path, as if that had been an Ind-
trail. Perchance it was--for some of
The paths we travel are much older than
we think--especially some which the
colored race in our midst still use--
for they are nearest to the Ind. trails.
57 9/3/56
*Capt. Hub. said on Sunday that he had
plowed up an Indian gouge--but how
little an impression that had make on him com-
pared with the rotting of his cranberries--
or the loss of meadow grass. It seemed to
me that it made an inadequate impression
compared with many trivial events. Suppose
he had plowed up 5 dollars!
1857
58 2/8/57
*The ground is so bare that I gathered
a few Indian relics.
59 3/27/57
A sunny day but rather cold air--
8 1/2 Am up Assabet-–in boat-- At last I
push myself gently through the smooth & sunny
water sheltered by the Island woods & hill-–where
I listen for birds &c-- There I may expect to hear
a woodpecker tapping the rotten aspen There I
pause to hear the faint voice of some early bird amid
the twigs of the still woodside. You are pretty sure
to hear a woodpecker early in the morning–-over these
still waters-- But now chiefly there comes home on the
breeze the tinkle of the song–sparrow along the
river side & I push out with wind & current--
Leave the boat & run down to the white maple
wht
by the bridge-- The ^ maple is well out with its
white stamens on the Southward boughs-–& prob.
began about the 24th-- That would be about 15 days earlier than
last year–-
*I find a very regular elliptical rolled stone–-in the
(last fall)
freshly ^ ploughed low ground there evidently brought
from some some pond or seaside. It is about 7 inches
long. The Indians prized such a stone & I have found
many of them where they haunted-- Commonly one or
both ends will be worne showing that they have used it
as a pestle or hammer--
60 4/10/57
There was an old gun hardly safe
to fire--said to be loaded with an in-
extractable charge--& also an old
sword over the door--also a tin sign
“D. Ricketson’s Office” (he having set
up for a lawyer once) & a small crum-
pled horn there-- I counted more than
20 rustic canes scattered about--a
dozen or 15 pipes of various patterns
mostly the common--2 spy glasses--an
open paper of tobacco--An Indians {jaw}
dug up--a stuffed blue-jay & pine gross-
beak & a rude Indian stone hatchet--
61 6/21/57
[at Cape Cod]
I sat down on the boundless level & enjoyed the solitude
drank it in-- The medicine for which I
had pined--worth more than the bear berry
so common on the Cape. As I was
sandy
approaching the bay through a ^ hollow
a mile this E of High Head, *I found 2
or 3 arrow points and a rude axe or ham-
mer--a flattish stone from the beach
with a deep groove chipped around it.
62 7/5/57
July 5th
Am--to Lees Cliff by boat--
Potentilla arguta abundantly out--
partridges big as quails *At Clam Shell
I found 3 arrowheads & a small
Ind. chisel for my guests. Rogers
determined the rate of the boat's progress
by his second hand
by observing ^ how long the boat was going
its length past a weed pad--calling
the boats length so much.
63 7/24/57
[Allegash trip]
Jackson in his report on the Geology of
maine in 1838 says of this mt--"Horn-stone,
which will answer for flints, occurs in various
parts of the State, where trap rocks have acted
upon silicious slate. The largest mass of
this stone known in the world is Mount
Kineo, upon the Moosehead lake, which ap-
pears to be entirely composed of it, and rises
700 feet above the lake level. This variety
of hornstone I have seen in every part of New
England in the form of Indian arrow{-}heads,
hatchets, chisels, &c. which were probably ob-
tained from this mountain by the aboriginal
%I have myself found at least 1000 made of the same material%
inhabitants of the country."%^% It is generally
slate colored with--white specks--becoming
uniformly white where exposed to the light
& air--and it breaks with a conchoidal
fracture--producing a ragged cutting
edge-- *I noticed some conchoidal hollows
more than a foot over-- I picked up a
small thin piece of stone which had so
sharp an edge--that I used it as
a dull knife--& fairly cut off an
with it
aspen 1 inch thick ^ by bending it &
making many cuts--though I cut my
fingers badly with the back of it in the
mean while.
64 7/30/57
Indians had recently camped there
& sat burned over the western End of the
island. We also saw where they had made canoes
in a little secluded hollow in the woods{--}
also where they would be out of the wind
on the top of the rock-- This must have
been a favorite resort for them anciently--
& we found here the point of an arrowhead
such as they have not used for 2 centuries.
& now know not how to make. P. picking
up a stone remarked to me “that
very strange lock (rock)” It was
a piece of hornstone probably brought there
by this tribe centuries before to make arrowheads
of--
65 8/7/57
Pm Rode to Old Fort Hill
at the bend of the Penobscot some 3 miles
above Bangor--to look for the site of the
Ind. town--
*Found several arrowheads--& 2 little dark
& crumbling fragments of Ind. earthen ware
--like black earth{!} q.v.
[back in Concord August 8]
66 8/24/57
Am Ride to Austin Bacon’s Natic--
. . .
On the N E base of this hill Bacon pointed
out to me what he called Ind. corn hills.
in heavy moist pasture ground--where
had been a pine wood--the hillocks were
4 ft apart
in singular rows--which ran along the
side of the hill, & were much larger than
you would expect after this lapse of time.
I was confident that if Indian, they
could not be very old--perhaps not more
than a century or so--for such could
never have been made with the ancient
Ind. hoes--clamshells--stones--or the
like, but with the aid of plows & white
men’s hoes-- Also pointed out to me what
he thought the home site of an Ind. squaw
marked by a Buck thorn bush--by the wall
These hillocks--were like tussocks with
lichens thick on them--& B thought
that the rows were not running as
a white man with furrow--
67 10/22/57
There is scarcely a square rod of sand
exposed in this neighborhood, but you
may find in it the stone arrowheads
of an extinct race-- {Far} back as that
time seems when men went armed with
bows & pointed stones here--yet so nu-
merous are the signs of it. The finer par-
ticles of sand are blown away & the arrow-
point remains-- The race is as clean gone
(from here) as this sand is clean swept
by the wind. Such are our antiquities--
These were our predecessors-- Why then
make so great ado about the Roman
& the Greek & neglect the Indian?
We not wander off with boys in our
imaginations to Juan Fernandez, to
wonder at a footprint in the sand
there-- Here is a point still more signifi-
cant at our doors--the print of a
race that has preceeded us, & this
{drawing} the little symbol that
Nature has transmitted to us. Yes this
arrow headed character is probably more
ancient than any other--& to my mind
it has not been decyphered.
1858
68 3/5/58
Mar 5
Went to hear a Chippeway Indian, a
Mung--somebody
Doctor ^--(assisted by a Penobscot, who said
nothing.) He made the audience
laugh unintentionally by putting an
and almost after this word alone
m after the word too ^ which he brought
in continually & unnecessarily--empha-
sising & prolonging that sound as
“They carried them home too m- -a-h”
as if it were a necessity for bringing
in so much of the Indian language
to his organs
for a relief--^ or a compensation
for “twisting his jaws about” as he said
in his attempts to speak English--
so Polis & the Penobscots--continually
put the um or em to our words.
as padlum littlum &c There was
so much of unsubdued Indian
accent resounding through his speech
so much of the bow-arrow tang-- I have
no doubt it was a great relief to him
& seemed the word best pronounced.
He thought his ancestors came from
Asia--& was sure that Bhering’s Strait
was no obstacle--since Indians or his
tribe cross Lake Huron & Superior in
birch bark canoes. Thought Indians
might be Jews because of a similarity
of customs-- When a party of his
warriors which to tell an advanced
concealed
party ^ in ^ a dangerous position to retreat
they shoot an arrow close past them--
if to stay they shoot an arrow over
exactly
their heads--& ^ this he declared the Jews
did. I inferred from his statement that
the totem (a deer in his case) takes
the place of the sirname with us. for
he said that his {post} children would
have the same totem. He did not use this
word.-- Said they had a secret
paternity like the masonic--by which
they knew & befriended members anywhere--
Had some ornaments of snake skins
4 or 6 inch broad with a bead edging--broad belts--
^ worn diagonally across the breast--
or for a garter--or for a very large & broad
string handle to a bag, passing round the
neck--also an otter skin pouch--
The bead left {on} was evidently very convenient
as well as important--to hold it when caught
under the belt-- It was thus very quickly re-
turned to its place. Had head feet & all.
Had on an eagle-feather cap--i.e. a
black
band with long ^ eagles feathers {strand} from
it--this not worn every day-- A buffaloe
blanket
skin ^ worked with porcupine quills--
Showed the cradle-- The mother cuts a
notch in the lower end for each day that passes
& one at the top for each moon. If it
falls into the water it floats on this--
said the first poetry made at Plymouths--
was suggested by the sight of this cradle swinging
from a tree. viz Rock a by baby &
Exhibited very handsome birch-bark
trays--ornamented with moose hair in-
in the false bottom & side
worked ^ representing strawberries &--very well-- Only
the white hair was not dyed. These were
made without communication with the whites--
The place the feet of the child in
the cradle straight or as they would have
them-- Ind. step with the feet straight
but whites who toe out--seem to have
no use for any toes but the great
one in walking. Ind. woven{s} are brought
up to toe in-- It is improper for them to
through a blow gun
toe out. Shot small arrows very
straight at an apple arod off--lodging
them all in it-- The gun was of elder
with the pith out about six feet long,
The arrows quite slender of hard wood
with a large & dense cylindrical mass
of common thistle down at what is Com-
monly the feathered end.
The Penobscot who chanced to be Joe
Polis brother, told me that the She-cor-
way of the maine lakes was the Shell-
drake & that when they call out
the moose at night they imitate the
voice of the Cow moose-- That of the
bull is very different.
The former carried the cradle low down on
his back with a strap round his head--& showed
how the mother could had both hands
free & could chop wood &c with her infant
on her back-- The same blanket covered
both if necessary--& the child was prevented
from being smothered by the bow over its face holding
He regretted that their marriage customs
up the blanket. were not so good as ours--that they did not choose
for themselves but their parents for them
We read the English poets--we study
botany & zoology--& Geology--lean
an dry as they are--& it is rare that we
get a new suggestion-- It is ebb tide with
the scientifi reports Prof-- in the chair
we would fain know something more about
these sto animals & stones & trees around us.
We are ready to skin the animals alive
to come at them. Our scientific names
convey a {very} partial information only--
they suggest certain thoughts only--
It does not occur to me that there are
other names for most of these objects
given by a people who stand between
me & them--who had better senses than
our race-- How little I know of that
arbor-vitae--when I have learned only what
science can tell me-- It is but a word
tree
It is {not}a thing of life-- But there are
20 words for the tree & its different parts which
the Indian gave--which are not in our
more
botanies--which imploy a ^ practical
& vital science. He used it every day--
He was well acquainted with its wood--& its
bark--& its leaves. No science does
more than arrange what knowledge
we have of any class of objects-- But
generally speaking how much more con-
versant was the Indian with any wild
animal or plant than we are--and in
his language is implied all that
intimacey as much as ours is expressed in
How many words in our language about the moose--or birch bark! & The like
our language-- ^ The Indian stood
nearer to wild-nature than we. The wildest
& noblest
^quadrupeds--even the largest fresh water
fishes Some of the wildest & noblest birds--
actually
& the fairest-flowers--have ^ receded
as we advanced--& we have but the
most distant knowledge of them--
a rumor has come down to us that
the skin of a lion was seen & his
roar heard here by an early settler--
But there was a race here that slept on
his skin. It was a new light when
my guide gave me Indian names for
things, for which I had only scientific
ones before. In proportion as I under-
stood the language I saw them from
a new point of view.
A dictionary of the Ind. language reveals
an other & wholly new life to us-- Look
at the wood Canoe--& see what a story
it tells of out-door life--with the names
of all its parts & modes of {using} it--
as our words describing the different parts
of a crack-- or at the word wigwam &
see how close it brings you to the ground--
or Indian Corn & see which race was
most familiar with it.-- It reveals
to me a life within a life--or rather a
life without a life--as it were threading
still
the words between our towns,^ & yet we can
never tread in its trail. The Indians’
earthly life was as far off from us
as heaven is.
69 3/18/58
But ah! the needles of the pine,
as I look down over the Holden wood & westward
how they shine! ^ Every third tree is lit with
the most subdued but clear etherial light--
as if it were the most delicate frost work
in a winter morning--reflecting no heat but
only light-- And as they rock & wave in the
strong wind even a mile off--the light
courses up & down them as over a field of
grain--i.e. they are alternately light & dark
--like looms above the forest--when the
shuttle is thrown between the light woof & the
{weaving} a light article spring goods for Nature to wear.
dark web-- ^ At sight of this my spirit
is like a lit tree. It runs or flashes over
their parallel boughs as when you play
with the teeth of a comb-- The pine tops
wave like squirrels’ tails flashing in the air
Not only osiers--but pine needles methinks
Anacreon noticed the same
shine in the spring--& arrow heads--& RR. rails-- ^ &c &c.
--Is it not the higher sun--& cleansed air--& greater
There is a warmer red to the leaves of
animation of nature? The Shrub oak & to the tail of the hawk
circling over them--
70 3/20/58
I had noticed from the Cliff by Lees road--
an elevated sandy point above Pole Brook
which I said must be Indian ground--*& walking
there I found a piece of a soap-stone pot.
In the sluice way of Pole Brook--by the
road just beyond I found another kind of Ind. pot
It was an eel-pot(?) or creel--a wattled basket--
or wicker-work--made of willow osiers {of} with
the bark on--very artfully-- It was about
4 fet long & shaped thus-- About a dozen (or
{drawing} Moore says that he used to find them in the
brooks when he was trout fishing stopping them
up so closely with sticks & stones on the sides that not
a trout could pass--& he would cut them
from end to end with his knife.
more) willow sticks as {bid} as { } finger--or larger
being set small end down--in a circle in a
thin round board which made the bottom
& then smaller osiers interwoven at right
angle with them--close & firm-- Another
funnel shaped basket--was secured within
this--extending about half way down {in it}--as
represented by the dotted lines--with a now opening
hardly 2 inches wide at the bottom--where only
a dozen sharper sticks approached each other.
There was a square door in the board bottom
by which the fishes could be taken out-- This
was set in that sluice way--with the mouth
or broad end down stream all sunk beneath
the surface-- This fishes being now evidently.
running up the brooks from the {p} river & ponds //
the ice being mostly gone out of the meadows &
brooks. We raised this and found 8 or 10 small
pickerel in it--the biggest a foot long--&
1 good sized perch. It was pleasant to find
that any were practising such {cunning} art
in the outskirts. I am not sure whether
this insertion is Indian--or derived from
our own ancestors-- Creel appears to be an
old English word-- But I have no doubt
that the Ind. used something very like this--
How much more we might have learned of the Aborigines
if they had not been so reserved-- Suppose they had
generally become the laboring class among
the whites--that my father had been a farmer
& had an Indian for his hired man--how many
aboriginal ways we children should have
learned from them!
71 9/21/58
Go to Cape Ann
A very warm day
Am Go with Russell to the rooms
of the Essex Institute--if that is the
name. See some In. pottery from the
{Cayuga} Reservation--fragments. very
pale brick color 3/8 inch thick with a
rude ornament--(ap. made with the end of
a stick--) of this form & size {drawing}
The lines representing slight hollows in a row around it--
Saw a stone--ap. slate--shaped
like the small “sinkers” but 6 inch x
3 1/2 with a small handle--{drawing}. found near
here--was it a sinker or pestle?
On the 24th at the E. Ind. Marine Hall
about
saw a circular stone mortar ^ 6 inch in
diameter--& a stone exactly like the above
in it--described as a pestle & mortar found
in making Salem Turnpike. Were they together?
Also at the last place--what was called
the blade of an Ind. knife found on
Gov. Endicott’s Farm--broken 3 or 4 inches
long--of a light colored kind of slate--
quite thin with a back. {drawing}
It might have been for skinning.
72 10/15/58
*On the sandy slope of the cut close by the
pond-- I notice the chips, which some Indian
fletcher has made-- Yet our poets & philosophers
regret that we have no antiquities in America--
no ruins to remind us of the past--
Hardly can the wind blow away the
surface anywhere exposing the spot-
less sand--even though the thickest
woods have recently stood there--but
these little stone chips, made by these
some aboriginal fletcher are revealed--
With them too--this time (as often) I
find the white man(s arm--a comel
conical bullet--still marked by the
groove of the rifle--which has been
roughened or rucked up like a thimble
on the side by which it struck the sand--
As if by some explained sympathy &
attraction the Indians & the white man(s
arrow-head sought the same grave at
last.
1859
73 3/13/59
On the N. E part of the Great Fields I
find the broken shell of a { } C. Blandingii
--on very dry soil-- This is the 5th then
I have seen in the town All the rest were 3
in the Great meadows (one of them in a ditch) &
1 within a rod or 2 of Beck Stow’s Swamp.
It is remarkable that the spots where
I find most arrowheads &c being light
dry soil--(as the Great Fields--Clam-
shell Hill--&c) are among the first
to be bare of snow--& the frost gets out
there first. It is very curiously & particu-
larly true--for the only parts of the
N. E section of the Great Fields which
are so dry that I do not slump there--
are those small in area--when perfectly
bare patches of sand occur--and then singularly
enough the arrowheads are particularly
common-- Indeed in some cases I find them
only on such bare spots a rod or 2 in extent
where a single wig wam might have stood--
& not half a dozen rods off in any direction
Yet the difference of level may not be
more than a foot--(if there is any).
It is as if the Indians had selected precise-
ly the driest spots on the whole plain with
a view to their advantage at this season--
If you were going to pitch a tent tonight
on the great fields you would inevitably
pitch on one of these spots--or else lie down
in water or mud--or on ice. It is as if they
had chosen the sight of their wig wams at
this very season of the year.
74 3/17/59
If I land now on any knoll which is
left dry above the flood--an island in
the meadow--& its surface is broken I am
pretty sure to find Ind. relics. They pitcht
their wigwams on these highest places--near water.
75 3/23/59
The prospect thence is a fine one, especially
at this season when the water is high- The
water is landscape is very agreeably diversified
with hill & vale & meadow--& cliff-- As we
look SW how attractive the shores of russet
capes & peninsulas laved by the flood!
Indeed that large tract E of the bridge
is now an island-- How fair that low
undulating russet land! At this season
and under these circumstances--the
sun just come out & the flood high around
it--russet--so reflecting the light of the
sun appears to me the most agreeable of
colors--& I begin to dream of a russet fairy-
land & elysium. How dark & terrene must be green--
but this smooth russet surface reflects almost
all the light. That broad & low but firm
island--with but few trees to conceal the
contour of the ground & its outline--with
its fine russet sward--firm & soft as velvet--
reflecting so much light--all the undulations
of the earth its nerves & muscles revealed by the
light & shade--& even the sharper ridgy edge
of steep banks where the plow has heaped up
the earth from year to year-- This is a sort
of fairy land & elysium to my eye-- The island
tawny couchant island! Dry land for the
Indian’s wigwam in the spring--& still strewn
with his arrow-points-- The sight of such
land reminds me of the pleasant spring days
in which I have walked over such tracts looking
for these relics. How well too this smooth
firm light reflecting tawny earth contrasts
with the darker water which surrounds it
-or perchance lighter sometimes. At this
season when the russet colors prevail--the
contrast of water & land is more agreeable
to behold-- What an inexpressibly soft curving
line is the shore--! and if the water is per-
fectly smooth & yet rising-- you seem
to see it raised 1/8 of an inch with swelling
lip above the immediate shore it kisses as
in a cup--or the of a saucer--
Indian isles & promontories-- Thus we sit on
that rock--hear the first wood-frog’s croak
& dream of a russet elysium-- Enough
for the season is the beauty there of-- Spring
has a beauty of its own--which we would
not exchange for that of summer--and
at this moment--if I imagine the fairest
earth I can it is still russet--such
is the color of the blessed isles-- & they are
surrounded with the phenomena of spring.
76 3/28/59
Mar 28
Pm Paddle to the Bedford line--
It is now high time to look for
arrowheads &c-- I spend many hours
every spring gathering the crop with the
melting snow & rain have washed bare--
When at length some island in the
meadow or some sandy field elsewhere
has been plowed perhaps for rye in the fall
I take note of it, & do not fail to
repair thither as soon as the earth begins
to be dry in the spring. If the spot chances
never to have been cultivated before--I am
the first to gather a crop from it-- The
farmer little thinks that another reaps
a harvest which is the fruit of his
toil-- As much ground is turned up in a
day by the plow as Indian implements
could not have turned over in a month--
& my eyes rest on the evidences of an
aboriginal life which passed here a
thousand years ago perchance-- Especially
if the knolls in the meadows are washed
by a freshet where they have been plowed the
previous fall--the soil will be taken away
lower down & the stones left--the
arrowheads &c--& soapstone pottery
amid them.--some what as gold
is washed in a dish–-or tom--
*I landed on 2 spots this Pm &
picked up a dozen arrowheads--
It is one of the regular pursuits of the
spring. As much as sportsmen go in
pursuit of ducks--& gunners of musquash
and scholars of rare books--and travellers
of adventures & poets of ideas-- & all
men of money--I go in search of
arrowheads when the proper season comes
round again-- So I help myself to live
worthily--& loving my life as I should--
It is a good collyrium to look on the
bare earth--to pore over it so much--
getting strength to all your senses like An-
taeus-- If I did not find arrowheads I
might perchance begin to pick up crockery
fragments of
& { }^pipes--the relics of a more recent
man-- Indeed you can hardly name
an more innocent or wholesome enter-
tainment. As I am thus engaged--I hear
the rumble of the bowling alley thunder
which has begun again in the village.
It comes before the earliest natural
thunder-- But what its lightning is
& what atmospheres it purifies I do
not know. Or I might collect the
various bones which I come across
They would make a museum
that would delight some owen--at last
& what a text they might furnish me
for a course of lectures on human
life or the like-- I might spend my
days collecting the fragments of pipes
until I found enough after all my search
to compose one perfect pipe when laid
together.
I have not decided whether I had better
publish my experience in searching for
with plates & an index
arrowheads in 3 volumes--^ or try to compress
it into one. These durable implements
seem to have been suggested to the In-
dian mechanic--with a view to my
entertainment in a succeeding period.
After all the labor expended on --
the bolt may have been shot but once
perchance--& the shaft which was
devoted to it decayed--& there lay the
arrowhead sinking into the ground--awaiting
me-- They lie all over the hills with
like expectation--and in due time the
husbandman is sent--& tempted by
the promise of corn or rye--he plows
the land & turns them up to my view.
Many as I have found--methinks the
last one gives me about the same delight
that the first did. Some time or
often, you would say, it had rained
arrowheads for & they lie all over
the surface of America. You may have
your peculiar tastes--certain localities
in your town may seem from association
unattractive & uninhabitable to you--
You may wonder that the land {bears}
any money value there & pity {some}
poor fellow who is said to survive
in that neighborhood-- But plow
up a new field there--and you
will find the omnipresent arrowpoints
strewn over it--& it will appear
that the red man with other tastes
& associations lived there too.
No matter how far from the modern
road or meeting house, no matter how
near-- They lie in the meeting house
cellar--& they lie in the distant
cow pasture-- And some collections
which were made a century ago by the
curious like myself have been dispersed
again--& they are still as good as new--
You can not tell the 3rd hand ones (for
they are all 2nd hand) from the others.
Such is their persistent out of door
durability-- For they were chiefly
made to be lost-- They are sown like
a grain that is slow to germinate broad
cast over the earth-- Like the dragons
teeth which bore a crop of soldiers--these
bear crops of philosophers & facts--& the
same seed is just as good to plant again.
It is a stone fruit. Each one yields
{ } a thought. I come nearer to the maker
of it than if I found his bones-- His bones
would not prove any wit that wielded
them--such as this work of his bones does--
It is humanity inscribed on the face of the
earth--patent to my eyes--as soon as the
snow goes off--not hidden away in some
cript--or grave--or under a pyramid--
No disgusting mummy--but a clean
stone--the best symbol or letter that
could have been transmitted to me-- The
Red Man--his mark {drawing}! at
every step I see it--& I can easily supply
the Tahitawan or Mantatukets that
might have been written if he had had
a clerk-- It is no single inscription
on a particular rock--but a footprint
--rather a mind print--left every where
& altogether illegible-- No vandals
however vandalic in their disposition can
be so industrious as to destroy them
Time will soon destroy the works of
famous painters & sculptors--but
the Indian arrow head will balk his
efforts & Eternity will have to come to his
aid. They are not fossil bones--but
as it were fossil thoughts--forever re-
minding me of the mind that shaped them.
I would fain know that I am treading
in the tracks of human game--that I
am on the trail of mind--& those
little reminders never fail to set me
right-- When I see these signs I know
that the subtle spirits that made
them are not far off into whatever
form transmuted-- What if you do
plow & hoe amid them--& swear that
not one stone shall left upon another--
They are only the less like to break in that
case-- When you turn up one layer
you bury another so much the more
securely-- They are at peace with rust--
This arrowheaded character promises
to out last all others-- the larger pestles
& axes may perchance grow scarce &
be broken--but the arrowhead shall
perhaps never cease to wing its way through
the ages to eternity. It was originally
winged for but a short flight--but
it still to my minds eye wings its way thro
the ages bearing a message from the
hand that shot it-- Myriads of arrow
points lie sleeping in the skin of the re-
volving earth--while meteors revolve
in the space-- The footprint--the mind-
print of the oldest men-- When some vandal
chieftain has razed to the earth the
British Museum & perchance the winged
bulls from Nineveh shall have lost
most if not all of their features--
the arrowheads which the museum
contains will perhaps find themselves
at home again in familiar dust--
& resume their shining in new
springs upon the bared surface of
the earth then--& be picked up for
the thousandth time by the shephard
or savage that may be wandering there--
& once more suggest their story to him.
Indifferent they to British museums--&
no doubt Nineveh bulls are old acquain-
tances of theirs--for they have camped
on the plains of Mesopotamia too--
& were buried with the winged bulls.
They cannot be said to be lost nor
found. Surely their use was not so
much to bear its fate to some bird
or quadruped--or man--as it was to
lie here near the surface of the earth
for a perpetual reminder to the generations
that come after-- As for museums
I think it is better to let Nature take
care of our antiquities-- These are our--
antiquities & they are cleaner-- to think
of than the rubbish of the Tower of London.
& they are a more ancient armor than
is there. It is a recommendation that
they are so in obvious--that they occur
only to the eye & thought that chances to
be directed toward them. When you
pick up an arrowhead & put it in your
pocket--it may say {but} Eh--you
think you have got me, do you? but I
shall wear a hole in your pocket at last.
or if you put me in your cabinet
--your heir--or great grandson--will
negl forget me--or throw me out
the window directly--or when the house
falls I shall drop into the cellar–- &
there I shall lie quite at home again.
Ready to be found again eh? Perhaps
some {new} red man that is to come will fit
me to a shaft & make me do his
bidding for a bow shot--What reck I?
77 4/1/59
I land again at the (now island) rock,
on Simon Brown’s land--& look for arrowheads
*& picked up 2 pieces of soap stone pottery--
one was probably part of the same which
C. found with me there the other day. C’s piece
was one side of a shallow dish say 1 1/2 inches
deep 4/8 to 6/8 inch thick with a sort of
ear for handle on one side--almost a leg
{drawing} {drawing} His piece, like mine, looks
as if it had been scratched all over on the
outside by a nail & it is evident that
this is the way it was fashioned-- It was
scratched with some hard sharp pointed
stone & so crumbled & worn away.
This little knoll was half plowed (through
its summit) last fall in order to be culti-
standing over all but the apex
vated this spring--& the high water^ has
for a fortnight been faithfully washing
away the soil & leaving the stones--Ind relics
& others--exposed-- The very roots of the grass--
yellowish brown fibres--are thus washed
clean & exposed in considerable quantity there--
You could hardly have contrived a better way
to separate the arrow heads that lay buried in
that sod between the rocks--from the sod
& soil--
78 4/7/59
The white mans relics in the field are like the Indians
pipes--pottery--& (instead of arrow heads) bullets.
79 4/24/59
There is a season for everything, & we
do not notice a given phenomenon–-except
at that season–-if indeed it can be called
the same phenomenon at any other season–-
There is a time to watch the ripples on
Ripple-lake–-to look for arrowheads–-
to study the rocks–-& lichens–-a time to
walk on sandy deserts–-& the observer
of nature must improve these seasons
as much as the farmer his.
80 4/30/59
I noticed under the S edge of the Holden Wood
on the arrow-head field a great many little birches
in the grass–-ap. seedlings of last year–- & I take
up a hundred & 10 from 3 to 6 or 7 inches high.
81 5/2/59
I feel no desire to go to California or Pikes
Peak–- but I often think at night with
inexpressible
^ satisfaction & yearning–-of the arrowheadiferous
sands of Concord. I have often spent whole
afternoons, esp. in the spring,–-pacing back
& forth over a sandy field–-looking for these
relics of a race. This is the gold which our
sands yield. The soil of that rocky spot
on Simon Brown’s land is quite ash colored
–-(now that the sod is turned up) by Indian
fires–-with numerous pieces of clo coal in it.
There is a great deal of this ash-colored soil
in the country–- We do literally plough up
the hearths of a people & plant in
their ashes. The ashes of their fires colors
much of our soil.
82 5/4/59
After crossing the arrowhead fields we
see a woodchuck run along & climb to
the top of a wall & sit erect there–-our
first-- It is almost exactly the color of the
ground & the wall & the bare brown twigs.
83 10/16/59
*Every rain exposes new arrow heads--we stop
at Clam Shell & dabble for a moment in the relics
of a departed race.
84 10/17/59
What I put into my pocket--whether
berry or apple generally has to keep company
with an arrowhead or 2. I hear the latter
clinking against a key as I walk. These
are the perennial crop of Concord fields.
If they were sure it would pay--we should see
farmers raking the fields for them.
1860
85 2/13/60
*The ground being bare I pick up 2 or 3 arrow-
heads in Tarbells field near Ball's Hill.
86 3/2/60
Now for some days look for arrow heads
where it is not too soft
87 3/18/60
*C. picks up at Clam Shell--a very thin piece
of pottery--about 1/8 inch thick--which appears
to contain much pounded shell.
88 3/24/60
*I find on Indian ground, as today on
the Great Fields--very regular oval
stones like large pebbles--sometimes 5 or
6 inches long--water worn of course--
& brought hither by the Ind. They commonly
show marks of having been used as hammers.
Often in fields where there is not a stone
of that kind in place for a mile or more.
89 3/25/60
[summary of characteristics and activities of March]
The 7th is a day of misty rain & mistling.
--& of moist brown earth--into which you sink
as far as it is thawed at every step-- Every now
& then the mist thickens & the rain drives in
upon you from one side-- Now you admire
the various brown colors of the parded earth--
the plump cladonias--&c &c
Perchance you notice the beomyces in fruit
& the great chocolate colored puff ball
still loosing its dust and {on} bare sandy places
then
the {lycoperdon} stellata--& ^ your thoughts
are directed to arrowheads--& you gather
the first Ind. relics for the season--
The open spaces in the river are {now} long reaches
& the ice between is mackerelled--& you
no longer think of crossing it except
at the broadest bay. It is perhaps lifted up
by the melted snow & {the} rain–
90 6/22/60
On the NE side of the Great Fields
there are 2 or 3 little patches of sand {one} to
{2 rods} across--with a few slivers of arrowhead
stone sprinkled over them-- It is easy to find an
arrow head if it is exposed-- These spots are plowed
only by the wind & rain--& yet I rarely cross
them but I find a new arrow head exposed.
91 7/7/60
In the pm of July 3d--when the air
at our house at 2 o clock was 82̊--a
breezy afternoon--the little arrow head
desert on Sted. Buttrick's Land in the Great
fields, the therm. being buried 1 3/4 inches deep
rose to 90̊ at 3 inches deep to 86̊--Lying
flat on the surface back up--to 86-- Held
in air above to 84̊
92 8/22/60
The recent heavy rains have washed
away the bank here considerably--& it looks
& smells more mouldy with human relics
than ever-- I therefore find myself inevitably exploring
it. On the edge of the Ravine, whose be-
ginning I witnessed, one foot beneath the surface--
& just over{--}a layer some 3 inches thick of pure
shells & ashes--a gray white line on the
face of the cliff--*I find several pieces of
Ind. pottery with a rude ornament on it--
not much more red than the earth itself.
Looking farther I find more fragments which
sandy
have been washed down the ^ slope--in a stream
as far as 10 feet--I find in all 31 pieces.
Averaging an inch in diameter & about
several
1/3 of an inch thick. Many of them made
part of the upper edge of the vessel--
& have a rude ornament encircling them
in 3 rows, as if pricked with a stick in the
soft clay--& also another line on the narrow
edge itself-- At first I thought to match
the pieces again, like a geographical puzzle,
but I did not find that any 2 belonged to-
gether. The vessel could have been quite
large & I have not {got} nearly all of it.
It appears to have been an impure clay--with much
sand & gravel in it--& I think a little pounded
shell-- It is very unequal thickness--some of
the unadorned pieces (prob. the bottom) being 1/2
inch thick--while near the edge it is not more
than 1/4 of an inch thick. There was {under}
this spot & under the layer of shells a
manifest hollowness in the ground--not
yet filled up. I find many small pieces of
bone in the soil of this bank--prob. of
animals the Ind. ate.
In another part of the bank in the midst
of a much larger heap of shells which
has been exposed--*I found a delicate stone
tool of this form & size--of a
{drawing}
soft slate stone. It is very thin & sharp
on each side{s} edge--& in the middle is not
more than 1/8 inch thick-- I suspect
that this was used to open clams with.
It is curious, that I had expected to find
as much as this--& in this very spot too
before I reached it (I mean the {s}pot)--
Indeed I never find a remarkable Ind. relic,
and I find a good many, but I have
first divined its existence, & planned the
discovery of it. Frequently I have told my-
self distinctly what it was to be before I
found it.
93 9/22/60
*Find more pieces of that Ind. pot. have now 38 in all
Evidently the recent rise of the river has carried
the lower leaves of the button bush to fall. A perfectly
level line in these bushes marks the height to
which the water rose--many or most of
the leaves so high having fallen.
94 10/31/60
Consider what a demand for
arrowheads there must be that the
sufrace of the earth should be thus
sprinkled with them--the arrowhead
& all the disposition it implies toward both
man & brute. There they lie pointed still
making part of the sands of almost
every field.
95 11/26/60
But where did the pitch pines stand originally?
Who cleared the land for its seedlings to
spring up-- -- It is commonly referred to very
poor & sandy land-- Yet I find it growing
on the best land also-- The expression a
pitch-pine plain is but another name
for a poor & sandy level-- Who knows
but the fires or clearings of the Indians
may have to do with the presence of these
trees there? They regularly cleared extensive tracks
for cultivate--& these were {were} always level
tracts where the soil was light--such
as they could turn over with their rude hoes--
Such was the land which they are
known to have cultivated extensively in this town
--as the great fields--& the rear of Mr
Dennis--sandy plains-- It is in such
places chiefly that you find their relics
in my part of the country-- They did not
cultivate such soil as our maple swamps
occupy--or such a succession of hills & dales as
this oak wood covers-- Other trees will grow
where the {p.} pine--does--but the former will
maintain its ground there the best. I know
of no tree so likely to spread rapidly over such areas
when abandoned by the aborigines--as the
pitch pines--and next birches & white pines--
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