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The native inhabitants of Australia, the Maoris of New Zealand, the aboriginal races of other Polynesian islands, the natives of the Greater and Lesser Antilles — such as they were at the time of the discovery of America — and the Red races distributed through the New World from Patagonia to the lands of the Esquimaux, were all, at least until a recent date — as many of them still are — unacquainted with the use of metals in any form. They therefore belong to the age of stone as much as did the barbarians of prehistoric times.
— JOHN CLARK RIDPATH