28 THE MAGIC OF JEWELS AND CHARMS
To another possible conception along the same lìnes we have already alluded.
An
instance is reported where a very carious quartz pebble, one-half
white and the other black, was found within the hand bones of the
skeleton of an Indian ; the finder carried it about with him for many
years as a "lucky stone," but it appears that his personal experience
of its effects, if these can be judged from what happened to the bearer
of such a talisman, has been of a kind to shatter the most robust faith
in the protective power of his Indian charm. Possibly the strange relic
may have symbolized night and day for the Indians, and thus have been
believed to guard the wearer or the person with whom it was buried, at
all times and seasons. That pebbles of this sort were sometimes buried
in the ground, disposed in circles and squares, is vouched for by some
who claim to have unearthed them in ploughing, but our informant was
not able to confirm these statements, as the arrangements had always
been effectually disturbed before he reached the spot.49
In
many graves of the primitive Red-paint People of Maine, small pebbles
have been found. As they were not large enough to have served as
paint-grinders, and as but one such pebble occurs in any single grave,
the presumption is quite strong that they were considered as talismans
for the dead. The fact that the practical laborers of our day who dug
out these graves instinctively named the pebbles "lucky stones" goes to
prove that this supposition is not too far-fetched, although there is
no positive evidence to support it. The pebbles were yellow, bright
red, or gray in color, the graves explored being at Orland, Maine, as
well as at the outlet of Lake Alamoosook, on the south side of this
lake and at Passadumkeag; indeed such graves have been
" Communicated by Dr. Charles C. Abbott.
