158 Chinese Clay Figures 



and the other (Rhinoceros brancoi) possibly to the single-horned Indian 

 species. This fact is in striking agreement with the result of our his- 

 torical investigation, according to which these two species were known 

 to the ancient Chinese and distinguished by the two names si and se. 

 In view of the acquaintance of the Chinese with these two species, the 

 question as to the age of the fossil remains is, of course, important. 

 According to the researches of Schlosser, the number of species of 

 fossil rhinoceroses traceable in China amounts to at least seven, three 

 of which originate from the Pleistocene, four from the Pliocene; and 

 Schlosser was able to prove that Rhinoceros sinensis Owen does not rep- 

 resent a species from the Tertiary, as presumed heretofore, but should 

 be rather one from the Pleistocene. 1 There is, accordingly, from a 

 geological viewpoint, good reason to believe that several species of 

 rhinoceros could have survived on Chinese soil down to the historic 

 period when man made his first appearance there; 2 and it is in the rec- 

 ords of the Chinese that this fact has been preserved to us. It even 

 seems to me (but this is the mere personal impression of a layman, which 

 may not be acceptable to a specialist in this field) that the Chinese rec- 

 ords, in a highly logical manner, fill a gap between the palasontological 

 facts of Siberia and the present-day existence of the hairy two-horned 

 rhinoceros in south-eastern Asia. If it is admissible to identify the 

 Siberian tichorhinus with the latter species, or to consider the former 

 as the primeval ancestor of the latter, it is conceivable that the Siberian 

 animal, pressed by the advance of the ice, started on a migration south- 

 ward, and first halted in northern China, where it became the si of the 

 Chinese, and whence it finally proceeded south-east. Whatever this 

 fancy may be worth, there can be no doubt of two points, — first, 

 that the ancient Chinese, from the very beginning of their history, 

 were acquainted with two species of rhinoceros, the single-homed and 

 the two-horned ones, distinguished as se and si; and, second, that the 



1 L. c, p. 52- 



2 We owe to M. Schlosser an interesting discovery in regard to the age of man 

 on Chinese soil. He describes (pp. 20-21) and figures a tooth, a molar (m 3 ) of the 

 left upper jaw, which originates either from man or from a new anthropoid. This 

 tooth is perfectly fossilized, wholly untransparent, and shows between the roots a 

 reddish clay, such as is found only in teeth really coming from the Tertiary, and not 

 from the loess; so that the author is inclined to ascribe to it a tertiary origin, or at 

 all events, a very great age, going back at least to old Pleistocene. A definite solution 

 of the problem cannot be reached at present. "The purpose of this notice is," con- 

 cludes Schlosser, "to call the attention of subsequent investigators, who may have 

 an opportunity of undertaking excavations in China, to the possibility that either 

 a new fossil anthropoid or tertiary man, or yet an old-Pleistocene man, might be found. ' ' 

 I agree with Schlosser on this point, and regard his discovery, which certainly so far 

 remains entirely hypothetical, as highly suggestive, and pointing in the direction of 

 a future possibility of a new Pithecanthropus being discovered in Chinese soil. 



