DEPARTMENT OP PREHISTORIC ANTHROPOLOGY. 321 



our knowledge. The authors at that time saw him face to face, and 

 were thus enabled to describe him and write his history. He has con- 

 tinued with us ever since, and we have from that time to the present 

 Had full and ample opportunity to increase our information concerning 

 him by investigation, examination, and personal contact. 



In France and England, in fact over all Western Europe, the period 

 when the last possible contact with prehistoric man could have taken 

 place, the time when all our knowledge concerning him, acquired from 

 observation, was gained, ended with the invasion by Caesar. So that, 

 while the American goes back no further than two hundred and eighty 

 \ ears to study the prehistoric man of his country, and has had him pres- 

 ent ever since, tin- Frenchman, the European, has to go back nigh two 

 thousand years, and his opportunities of personal contact ended at that 

 time, if if had not done so before; for it is not at all certain that the 

 Gaul of that epoch is to be considered as prehistoric. He may have 

 been related to him, possibly his descendant, but it appears certain 

 that the prehistoric bronze age had ended in that country, and the iron 

 age begun, from four hundred to nine hundred years before the advent 

 of Caesar. 



1 have said this much to show the difference in the respective oppor- 

 tunities for the study of prehistoric man between Europeans and Amer- 

 icans. The territory of France is about 200,000 square miles ; that of 

 the United States is about 3,600,000 — eighteen times larger than France. 

 Mile for mile and acre for acre, the United States will yield as much to 

 the student of prehistoric archaeology as will that of France; yet with 

 this difference in area of equal fruitfuluess, the United States Govern- 

 ment is far behind that of France in its interest and assistance given to 

 this science. Compare the National Museum of France, to wit, that of 

 St. Germain, with the department of the National Museum of the United 

 States. The St. Germain Museum is installed at St. Germain -en-Laye, 

 a few miles out of Paris — the palace of that name, built by Francis I. 

 1 have not the exact dimensions, but it is in the form of a triangle; the 

 front or shortest line is, I should say. 400 feet long. It is given up en- 

 tirely to the officers of the institution and to the chambers and living 

 apartments of the officers. The other line of the right angle has been 

 (in-- proofed throughout and completely restored, and is now occupied 

 with the halls of exhibition. This restoration is being continued upon 

 the other wing. The work began in 1879 and is not yet completed. 

 The building is four stories high, and there are now twenty-five halls 

 tilled with prehistoric objects and open to the public. One entire story 

 US devoted each to the paleolithic and neolithic periods of the stone age 

 and one to the bronze age, while the basement contains the heavy 

 stone, principally architectural monuments, of the Roman occupation. 



Except the latter, the display made, the objects shown, the epochs, 

 periods, or ages represented, are the same as those now crowded into 

 my hall. With all her wealth of antiquity eighteen times greater than 

 H. Mis. l'4T, pt. 2 21 



