extreme limit of the Stone age in Algeria, but quite recently traces
of primitive man have been discovered amongst the Tuaregs. These
relics are hatchets made of black rock, and arrow-heads not unlike
those which the Arabs attribute to the Djinn; but as we approach the
south we find the flints picked up more clumsily and unskilfully cut
-- a proof that they were the work of a more barbarous people with
less practical skill. It is the megalithic monuments of Algeria,
of which we shall speak more in detail presently, that are the most
worthy of attention. As in India, we meet with them in thousands,
and in certain parts of the continent they extend for considerable
distances. They consist of long, square, circular, or oval enclosures
-- dolmens similar to those of Western Europe, -- and almost always
surrounded by circles of upright stones. The silence of historians
respecting them need not make us doubt their extreme antiquity, for
did it not take a very long time to induce the scientific men of our
day to turn their attention to Algeria at all?

The exploration of Tunisia has enabled us to study the Stone age
in that district, and a few years ago it was announced that nearly
three thousand objects of different types had been found in thirteen
different localities.[38] My son found near Gabes an immense number
of small worked flints not unlike a human nail, the origin and use of
which no one has been able to determine. The association of weapons
and implements roughly finished off, with chips and stones still in
the natural state, bears witness to the existence at one time of
workshops of some importance. The recent discoveries of Collignon
correspond with those in Algeria, and complete our knowledge of the
basin of the Mediterranean.

In the Cave of Hercules, in Morocco, which Pomponius Mela spoke