TOOLS AND UTENSILS.
The tool is not the end or aim of art, but its means; it is a prerequisite to further steps in the march of invention, and is devised to enable man to overcome the resistance of the material which he wishes to bring under his control and apply to the satisfaction of his wants. Early and rude tools serve many purposes. The sharpened flint of the savage cuts and shapes his arrow, carves and skins the animal which is slain, dresses its hide and scrapes its sinews into strings and its claws into ornaments, and takes the place of all the thousand implements in modern work shops. But here, as elsewhere in nature, the general law of progress, which is none other than the application of the principle of "differentia tion and specialization," came soon into play, and tools were devised for limited and special purposes.
Early Stone a sharpened flint or other hard stone was probably the first of tools fashioned by the pre-historic man, and to this day has not fallen out of use. As a " flesher" to flay cattle just such a stone implement as is excavated from the Ohio mounds is used now-a-days in some of the great meat-packing houses of the Western United States. Nothing better adapted to perform the work neatly and expeditiously has been devised.
The stone axes, chisels, and celts of the earlier strata of Europe and Asia approximate closely in form to those iu use by the American Indians at the period of the discovery. This does not demand for its explanation that the one nation borrowed from the other, but that simply this was the most convenient and appropriate shape of the tool, and as such it suggested itself spontaneously everywhere to the primitive artisan. That these seemingly rude tools are more effective than we are apt to sup pose was illustrated a few years ago by a Danish antiquary, who placed some of these stone implements from the Danish kitchen-middens in the hands of ordinary workmen, and with them, they constructed a well finished and even picturesque log cabin.
The !1lanufactzrre of Stone some remains in very ancient strata in France the opinion has been advanced that the first method of making such stone tools was by placing large masses of flint in the fire, which would splinter its surface into sharp-edged spalls (Mortillet). But striking two stones together to bring one of them to a cutting edge is so simple a procedure that we may well suppose it was coeval with the most primitive manufacturing. Only a long time subsequently do we find speci
mens the edges of which present neat parallel ehippings and symmetrical forms. The arts of grinding, polishing, and boring came slowly into use, but were brought to a singular degree of perfection. They were carried out by the aid of sharp silicious sand—the boring by twirling a hollow reed, its point being supplied with this sand moistened with water. These simple devices, backed by an unlimited supply of patience, enabled the native artisan to turn out some pieces of work which have excited the surprise of civilized experts. Thus, a specimen of Aztec work in hard stone is preserved which represents a coiled snake, through the length of whose body, following each sinuosity, runs a clean, well-cut perforation.
The Hammer, pounding and beating, a stone so shaped that it could conveniently be grasped in the hand was the implement offered by nature. Its power was greatly increased by fastening it with a withe or cord to the end of a stick or perforating it with a hole for the handle. This formed the hammer, and so clearly is its origin preserved in its name that the word hammer, in Old German Izamar, is considered by some ety mologists a derivative of the Sanskrit word for stone.
Knives, scrapers, chisels, hoes, adzes, drills, awls, gouges, and numer ous other tools were deftly chipped or pecked from stone, and in Mex ico long, keen-edged obsidian flakes were even employed as razors, and answered the purpose quite well. (See STONE AGE and illus. Vol. II.) Metal discovery of metals was, however, that which gave the greatest impulse to the industrial arts, especially the compound of copper and tin known as bronze, and later iron and steel. The ancient nations fully appreciated what a wondrous boon these had been, and hon ored correspondingly the labor of the smith, assigning a position among the highest gods to the patron and founder of the art of working metals. Thus, among the Greeks Hephestos, among the Latins Vulcan, and among the ancient Germans Thor, were represented with their hammers, and the myths related wonders of their skill at the anvil. The old Norse men dreamed of no nobler employment for their gods than the creative art-work of the smithery. Thus their ancient song, the " Voluspa," tells how "The Aesar come together on the Ida field; Ilou,es and havings high they heap up.