GEOGRAPHY AXD ANTIQUITIES. 357 



the form of the features and the outline of the face were very dif- 

 ferent from those of the more recent race. 



Prof. J. D. Whitney read a paper on a fossil human skull found 

 in Calaveras County, California, at the bottom of a shaft 130 feet 

 deep. Above the layer of gravel in which it was found were 4 

 beds of lava, with 3 of gravel interposed between them. Large 

 portions of the skull were gone, rendering it impossible to identify 

 the race of men to which it belonged with any certainty, but they 

 appeared not to differ much from the present Esquimaux, From the 

 manner in which the skull was fractured. Prof. Whitney concluded 

 that it was swept with many other bones down a shallow but vio- 

 lent stream, where it was exposed to the boulders of the bed. In 

 its passage it was broken, and at last came to rest in a position 

 where water charged with calcareous matter had access to it, on a 

 base of auriferous gravel. From all the circumstances the speaker 

 thought the owner of the skull lived before the glacial epoch, and 

 that man had therefore seen and survived that great convulsion. 



It remains to indicate what follows if the discovery be accBpted 

 as true. The period of man's existence is extended back for ages 

 beyond what geologists have ever assigned to it before. Since the 

 stream flowed in that ancient water-course by the side of which 

 this skull was found, a deposit of 130 feet of earth, lava, and 

 basalt has been placed above it, and another river has worn an- 

 other valley to a depth of thousands of feet through the rock wliich 

 formed the site of the ancient valley. The geologist shrinks from 

 naming the number of thousands of years which forms the lowest 

 period necessary for bringing about such changes. The'fact, how- 

 ever, that such changes must have taken place since the water 

 ceased to flow in the ancient stream can no more be denied than 

 the multiplication table. 



There was great difference of opinion expressed on the subject 

 of this skull, and a general feeling that the evidence did not war- 

 rant the conclusion of the great antiquity of man founded upon it. 



PRE-HISTORIC MAN. 



At the 1868 meeting of the British Association, Mr E. B. Tylor 

 read a paper on the " Condition of Pre-historic Races as inferred 

 from Observation of Modern Tribes." The object of the paper 

 was to show that there must have been a great similarity of char- 

 acter between those who lived in the four great pre-historic ages 

 and the character of the savages and serai-savages of Africa, Aus- 

 tralia, and America of the present day. Tliis was illustrated by 

 references to the arts, manners, customs, and pursuits of modern 

 barbarians and those of the pre-historic ages as shown by the relics 

 that had been found in mounds in various j^arts of the world. 

 One of the most interesting points of the paper was a description 

 of the funeral rites and superstitions prevailing among both the 

 pre-historic and modern savages. On the whole, the author thought 

 that there was striking evidence that in very ancient times Europe 

 was inhabited by savage tribes, but he did not think they would 



