472 AN'JIQUITY OF MAN. 



the time when the languages containing such words sei)arated from the 

 parent stock. Not only Prof. Iluxley, but Broca and otliers iiave 

 insisted that language as a test of race is as often as not, or even more 

 often tlian not, entirely misleading. The manner in which one form of 

 language flourishes at the expense of another ; the various ways in 

 which a language spreads even otherwise than by conquest ; the fact that 

 difi'erent races with totally different physical characteristics are fre- 

 quently found speaking the same language or but slightly ditferent 

 dialects of it; — all conduce to show how imperfect a guide comparative 

 philology may be so — far as anthropological results are concerned. 



Of late, pre-historic archaeology has been invoked to the aid of lin- 

 guistic researches ; but here again there is great danger of those who 

 are most conversant with the one branch of knowledge being but 

 imperfectly acquainted with the other. The difi'erent conditions i)re- 

 vailing in different countries, the degrees of intercourse with other 

 more civilized nations, and local circumstances which influence the 

 methods of life, all add difficulties to the laying down of any compre- 

 hensive scheme of archneological arrangement which shall embrace the 

 relics, whether sepulchral or domestic, of even so limited an area as 

 that of Europe. We are all naturally inclined to assume that the 

 record of the past is comparatively complete. But in archaeology no 

 more than geology does this appear to be the case. The interval 

 between the period of the river-gravels and that of the caves, such as 

 Kent's Cavern, in England, and those of the reindeer period of the 

 south of France, may have been but small, but our knowledge of the 

 transition is next to none. The gap between the Palaeolithic period 

 and the Neolithic has, to my mind, still to be bridged over, and those 

 who regard the occupation of the Belgian caves as continuous from 

 the days of the reindeer down to late Neolithic times seem to me pos- 

 sessed of great powers of faith. Even the relations in time between 

 the JijoJilcenmoddings of Denmark and the remains of the Neolithic age of 

 that country are not as yet absolutely clear; and who can flx the exact 

 limits of that age? Nor has the origin and course of extension of the 

 more recent Bronze civilization been as yet satisfactorily determined ; 

 and until more is known both as to the geographical and chronological 

 development of this stage of culture, we can hardly hope to establish 

 any detailed succession in the history of the Neolithic civilization that 

 went before it. In the meantime it will be for the benefit of our science 

 that speculations as to the origin and home of the Aryan family should 

 be rife ; but it will still more effectually conduce to our eventual knowl- 

 edge of this most interesting question if it be consistently borne iu 

 mind that they are but speculations. 



Turning from theoretical to practical subjects, I may call attention 

 to the vastly imj)roved means of comparison and study that the eth- 

 nologists of to-day possess as compared with those of 20 years ago. 

 Not only have the books and periodicals that treat of ethnology multi- 



