ON METEORITES, OR CELESTIAL STONES 77
kind
"have been found by people who explored a locality over which a
thunder-storm had swept and dug three feet in the ground"; and he adds
that some of these stone implements have two perforations. They were
named pi-li-chen, "stones originating from the crash of thunder," and a still earlier writer, Chang (232-300 a.D.) applies
a similar designation to stone axes and wedges "frequently seen among
the people." Several centuries later Shen Kun (1030-1093 A..D.)
testifies that the people of his time found many stone
"thunder-wedges," in all cases after a thunder-storm; these were
unperforated. It is generally believed that most of these stone
implements had been made by a Tungusian tribe, akin to the Manchus.8
This
is partly due to the fact that it was natural, after a thunder-shower,
for a search to be made. Then again, as thunder-showers are usually
heavy rains, they were apt to loosen the soil and leave on the surface
heavy objects, more especially such materials as jade, of the density
of 2.9, or jadeite, of the density of 3.3. These are much heavier than
the quartz, feldspar and other ingredients of the soil, which vary from
2.6 to 2.7 and are washed away. Finally, there is the natural
disinclination on the part of the Chinese to dig, from their belief
that it is wrong to explore the soil, and this disinclination on their
part has done much to prevent a better knowledge of the Stone Age, and
our knowledge of the races which must have preceded the civilization
of China; many facts of mining interest have been neglected, as well,
on account of this prejudice. Perhaps within the next twenty years we
may learn something about a prehistoric race in China, for as traces of
the existence of such races have been found in every other country of
the
•Läufer,
"Jade: A Study in Chinese Archaeology and Religion," Chicago, 1912, pp.
54, 55, 57, 63, 64; Field Museum of Natural History, Pub. 154,
Archaeological Series, vol. x.
