Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 38.djvu/523

Rh tin, they forsook copper for bronze and gradually attained a-wonderful skill in bronze-work. Finally, some of the European people became acquainted with iron, and its superior qualities drove out bronze, as bronze had driven out stone, from use in the manufacture of implements and weapons of the best class. But the process of substitution of copper and bronze for stone was gradual, and, for common purposes, stone remained in use long after the introduction of metals.

The pile-dwellings of Switzerland have yielded an unbroken archaeological record of these changes. Those of eastern Switzerland ceased to exist soon after the appearance of metals, but in those of the lakes of Neufchâtel and Bienne the history is continued through the stage of bronze to the beginning of that of iron. And in all this long series of remains, which lay bare the minutest details of the life of the pile-dwellers, from the neolithic to the perfected bronze stage, there is no indication of any disturbance such as must have been caused by foreign invasion; and such as was produced by intruders, shortly after the iron stage was reached. Undoubtedly the constructors of the pile-dwellings must have received foreign influences through the channel of trade, and may have received them by the slow immigration of other races. Their amber, their jade, and their tin show that they had commercial intercourse with somewhat distant regions. The amber, however, takes us no farther than the Baltic; and it is now known that jade is to be had within the boundaries of Europe, while tin lay no farther off than north Italy. An argument in favor of Oriental influence has been based upon the characters of certain of the cultivated plants and domesticated animals. But even that argument does not necessarily take us beyond the limits of southeastern Europe; and it needs reconsideration in view of the changes of physical geography and of climate to which I have drawn attention.

In connection with this question there is another important series of facts to be taken into consideration. When, in the seventeenth century, the Russians advanced beyond the Ural and began to occupy Siberia, they found that the majority of the natives used implements of stone and bone. Only a few possessed tools or weapons of iron, which had reached them by way of commerce; the Ostiaks and the Tatars of Tom, alone, extracted their iron from the ore. It was not until the invaders reached the Lena, in the far East, that they met with skillful smiths among the Jakuts, who manufactured knives, axes, lances, battle-axes, and leather