content_output-026_4 (Q5818)

WEAPONS which would kill at a distance were possessed by man in the prehistoric age; but what those arms were the archaeologist and ethnologist must decide. For the purpose of this treatise it is of small moment whether primitive man was better armed than the modern Ainu or the African pigmy. It is probable that the races of men coeval with the mastodon and the cave-bear were better armed than is generally supposed; the much-despised Australian aborigine, notwithstanding his lack of intelligence, is the inventor of two weapons—the 'boomerang' and the throwing-stick for hurling spears—which races much higher in the scale of humanity could not improve upon. So other weapons, as the sling and the bow, appear to have long preceded civilisation, and their use has been traced to times of remotest antiquity. The throwing of sticks and stones was doubtless the readiest method by which the aggressor could effect a result at a distance. Even monkeys will pelt their assailants with nuts; and the throwing of stones in the primitive fashion was one method of fighting generally practised throughout all ages. It was indulged in by the French and English even so recently as the battle of Alexandria (1801).