There may be no authentic history of Indians in
the particular locality in which these old-fashioned weapons come to
light, but their presence in the ground is the best kind of evidence
that Indians once lived on these fields or were in the habit of hunting
over them. In many parts of the country these arrow heads are turned up
in great numbers; museums large and small are plentifully supplied with
them; and they form part of the record of the men who once lived here,
and of their ways of killing game and destroying their enemies. Wherever
there are arrow heads there have been Indians.
Among every people and in every language there are found stories,
superstitions, traditions, phrases, which are not to be explained by the
thoughts or ideas or beliefs of people now living; and the same stories,
superstitions, phrases, are found among people as far apart as those of
Norway and Australia. The people of to-day tell these stories or
remember the superstitions or use the phrases without understanding
where they came from or what they meant when first used. As the ground
in some sections is full of arrow heads that have been buried no one
knows how many centuries, so the poetry we read, the music we hear, the
stories told us when we are children, have come down from a time in the
history of man so early that there are in many cases no other records or
remains of it.
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