xubbock: ox the axtiquitt or mak. 2G7 



We cannot but ask what manner of men they were who lived in 

 these distant times : did they resemble the present inhabitants of 

 Arctic Europe, who were regarded by a quaint old "n-riter of the last 

 century as beino; even lower than Apes,* or did the celebrated Nean- 

 derthal skull (Nat. Hist. Review, Yol. I. p. 155) belong to this race 

 of men ? We may hope that the discovery of a skeleton will ere 

 long enable us to answer this question ; may the veteran antiquary 

 of Abbeville himself be the fortunate finder of the first human bones 

 in the drift ! 



But were these the first settlers in Europe? M. Lartet answers in 

 the negative, and ingeniously attempts to construct a Palseontological 

 Chronology. (Ann. Sci. Nat. iv. ; Ser. V. xv. 6217.) The great 

 cave-bear ( Ursus sjjeJceus) has been frequently found associated with 

 man in caves, but its remains have, according to M. Lartet, not yet 

 been found in the river drifts. The species is indeed quoted by 

 Messrs. Buteux and Ravin, on whose authority it is also given by 

 Messrs. Prestwich and Evans ; but M. Lartet, after careful exami- 

 nation, not having been able to find the specimen originally attributed 

 to this species, concludes that the Ursus spelceus perished at an 

 earlier period, and that the Hyaena spelcea and the Felis spelcea 

 belong only to the earliest beds of the drift. The caves, therefore, 

 in which these animals have been found associated with the remains 

 of men, indicate, he thinks, a stiU greater antiquity for the human 

 race. 



Negative evidence in Palaeontology must indeed always be re- 

 garded with suspicion, but I may at least be permitted to repeat 

 the opinion that it is not in a northern country and in a cold climate 

 that we shall find the first traces of man. No nation would choose 

 such an abode ; civilised man, indeed, may prefer a temperate 

 region, favom-able to the exercise both of mind and body ; but the 

 savage wiU go where he can most readily satisfy savage wants ; he 

 will not therefore betake himself to temperate, still less to Arctic 

 regions, until driven there by increasing density of popidation. 



But are we justified in concluding that even the cave men were 

 the earliest human settlers in Western Europe ? Surely not. The 

 whole history of Palaeontology is a standing protest against such an 

 assumption. We have not indeed as yet the materials to decide 

 the question, but if we were to express any opinion on the subject, 

 it would seem more philosophical to imagine that the genus Homo 

 dates back to a period as ancient as the other widely-spread genera 

 of Mammalia; and that wherever the bones of Deer, Elephants, 

 Horses, Oxen and Dogs are to be found, there we may fairly expect 

 ere long to discover also the remaias of Man. 



* " Such is the description of this little animal, called a Laplander; and it may 

 " be said, that, after the Monkey, he approaches nearest to ^la.i\:'—Regnard'& 

 Journey to Lapland, p. 164. 



N. II. R.— 1862. U 



