XIV.] THE CAUCASIC PEOPLES. 529 



our round-heads with Broca's Kelts but for their stature. The 

 simplest explanation seems to be that the Bronze people were 

 really of Keltic speech, but came from the north of Gaul, where 

 the average height has always been somewhat higher than in the 

 south. 



After the passage of the Romans, who mingled little with the 

 aborigines and left few traces of their presence in 



Formation of 



the speech or type of the British populations, a the English 



rr Nation. 



great transformation was effected in these respects 

 by the arrival of the historical Teutonic tribes. The Ibero-Keltic 

 substratum was perhaps nowhere effaced, but rather thinned out 

 by the prolonged wars of conquest and all their attendant evils. 

 Large numbers undoubtedly migrated beyond the seas, Kymry to 

 Brittany, and to Ireland those Gaels who had still lingered on in 

 Britain. The residue were now gradually merged with the in- 

 truders in a common nationality of English speech, everywhere 

 except in the Keltic fringe, which then, and long after, still in- 

 cluded Cornwall and Cumberland. The Teutonic element was 

 later strengthened by the arrival of the Scandinavians and Normans, 

 all very much of the same physical type, after which no serious 

 accessions were made to this composite ethnical group, which 

 on the east side ranged uninterruptedly from the Channel to 

 the Grampians. Later the expansion was continued northwards 

 beyond the Grampians, and westwards through Strathclyde to 

 Ireland, while now the spread of education and the development 

 of the industries are already threatening to absorb the last strong- 

 holds of Kymric and Gaelic speech in Wales, the Highlands, and 

 Ireland. 



Thanks to its isolation in the extreme west, Ireland had been 



left untouched by some of the above described 



J Ethnic Re- 



ethnical movements. It is doubtful whether Palaso- lations in 



.... .. . .. Ireland. 



litnic man ever reached this region, and but few 

 even of the round-heads ranged so far west during the Bronze 

 Age. The prehistoric station explored by Mr F. J. Bigger at 

 Portnafeady near Roundstone, Connemara, yielded several stone 

 hammers, but neither worked flints nor metal-ware 1 , as if the 



1 Proc. R. Ir. Acad. in. May 1896. 

 K. 34 



