e were
edified by a conversation which we heard, or rather overheard, between
two sexagenarians--both well versed in antiquarian lore, and neither
of them deficient in antiquarian tenacity of opinion--respecting some
theory which one of them wanted to establish about some aborigines.
The concluding remark of the conversation--and we opined that it might
as well have formed the commencement--was--

"If you want to lay down _facts_, you must follow history; if you want
to establish a system, it is quite easy to place the people where you
like."

So, if I wished to "establish a system," I could easily make Eve work
with a "superfine drill-eyed needle:" but this is not my object.

It seems most probable that Eve's first needle was a thorn:

"Before man's fall the rose was born,
St. Ambrose sayes, without the thorn;
But, for man's fault, then was the thorn,
Without the fragrant rosebud, born."

Why thorns should spring up at the precise moment of the fall is
difficult to account for in a world where everything has its use,
except we suppose that they were meant for needles: and general
analogy leads us to this conclusion; for in almost all existing
records of people in what we are pleased to call a "savage" state, we
find that women make use of this primitive instrument, or a fish-bone.
"Avant l'invention des aiguilles d'acier, on a du se servir, a leur
defaut, d'epines, ou d'aretes de poissons, ou d'os d'animaux." And as
Eve's first specimen of needlework was certainly completed before the
sacrifice of any living thing, we may safely infer that the latter
implements were not familiar to her. The Cimbrian inhabitants of
Britain passed their time in weaving baskets, or in sewing together
for garments the skins of animals taken in the chase, while they used
as needles for uniting these simple habiliments small bones of fish or
animals rudely sharpened at one end; and needles just of the same sort
were used by the inhabitants of the Sandwich Islands, when the
celebrated Captain Cook first visited them.

Proceed we to the material of the first needlework.

"They sewed themselves fig-leaves together, and made themselves
aprons."

Thus the earliest historical record; and thus the most esteemed
poetical commentator.

"Those leaves
They gather'd, broad as Amazonian targe,
And, with what skill they had, together sew'd,
To gird their waist."

It is supposed that the leaves