AMONG the many points of distinction between man and the lower animals, we may consider the use of tools as one of the principal lines of demarcation. Man stands absolutely alone in this respect. There is no race of savages, however degraded they may be, that does not employ tools of some kind, and there is no beast, however intelligent, that ever used a tool except when instructed by man.

As to the stories that are told of the larger apes using sticks and stones by way of weapons, they are absolutely without foundation, no animal employing any tool or weapon save those given to them by Nature. It is true that a monkey may sometimes be seen to take a stone for the purpose of cracking nuts which are too strong for its teeth, and to perform that task with great deftness; but such animals have always been taught by man, and had they remained in their own country, not one of them would have used a stone, were the nuts ever so hard.

THE SPADE

We will begin our notice of tools by taking that which must have been the first tool invented by man. One of the principal duties assigned to man is the Culture of the earth, and this he cannot do without tools, increasing their number and improving their structure in proportion to his own development in agriculture.