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252 the remains of repasts. These shell-heaps were intercalated between the layers of ashes, and extended over several yards with a maximum depth of about 1 foot. In this bed (Assise à escargots) were also found harpoons and other relics similar to those in the bed of coloured pebbles ; and in addition to these there were portions of small chisel-like implements of stone with sloping and abraded ends (Fig. 103), but no regular stone axes only in the superincumbent layers were the latter found ; and above all were deposits containing objects of bronze and iron. It was also observed that the snail-shells had become altered to the variety known as Helix hortensis, which, it is said, indicated a drier climate.

P.252-fig.102-103-Palæolithic Man and Terramara Settlements in Europe.djvu.jpg

FIG. 102. Pebbles painted with red spots, from the Cave of Mas d'Azil (⅔). (Col. Piette.).

FIG. 103. Flint Implement, with a polished from the Cave of Mas-d'Azil (⅔). cutting edge, (Col. Piette.).

According to M. Piette there were changes in the external environments which could be correlated with these successive deposits.* As the Reindeer period passed away the climate became ameliorated but humid, as inferred from the presence of fruit-trees and the cultivation of grain. The people appear to have lost their artistic taste for carving on bones, and instead of it they manufactured harpoons of red-deer horn without a trace of ornament, painted selected pebbles with quaint devices or mere lines and round spots (Fig. 102), and practised some obscure sepulchral rites, in which the red paint on the desiccated bones seemed to play a part. M. Piette classified these painted stones into numerals, symbols, pictographs, and alphabetical characters, and to illustrate his views he issued a series of coloured plates showing the designs on some hundreds of these pebbles. Can there be any doubt about the genuineness of these pebbles ?

The chief interest in the discoveries at Mas-d'Azil lies