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the Gharybdia of bald fact. Messrs. Bateman and Carrington, for 

 mstance, aspired no higher than writing a journal of barrow-opening, 

 and though "Ten Years' Diggings" and the "Vestiges of the Anti- 

 quities of Derbyahu-e " are most useful storehouses of .information, it is 

 manifest that many little matters of importance either escaped notice, or 

 were unrecorded through their avowed disregard for any theory. Canon 

 Greenwell's review of facts, and the deductions from them, written as it 

 is with a knowledge of most that has been done by others, is both a 

 key to his own work and a fahly complete epitome of the science. 



The plan of the book is as follows : — First there is an " introduc- 

 tion " which contains the general review of fact and theory we have just 

 referred to. Next is an account of the author's own work, the thorough 

 examination of 234 tumuli or burial mounds. Nearly three-fourths of 

 these (the actual number is 162) are or were in Yorkshire, the East 

 Hiding containing the great majority. The remainder belong to the 

 counties of Cumberland, Westmoreland, Northumberland, Durham, and 

 Gloucester. The concluding pages are occupied by Professor Eolleston'a 

 description of the skulls and his observations on them, with an appendix 

 on the pre-historic fauna and flora. 



The introduction and the appendix are not the least valuable parts of 

 the book. We have already stated the high estimation in which the 

 former must be held. But of course all the conclusions of the authors 

 will not meet with general acceptance. Now and then an imperfect 

 acquaintance with well-known facts is disclosed. " British Barrows " 

 does not profess to be a full account of pre-historic Archseology. The 

 complete text-book of the science has yet to be written. As an instance 

 of oversight, one case will suffice. Every practical barrow-digger knows 

 that the ordinary " rat " of the tumuli is the Arvicola amphibia, and will 

 feel surprise that Prof. Eolleston see ms to consider the fact a discovery. 

 This httle creature is so constant a member of the barrow-fauna that it 

 has been said by one of our greatest practical archaeologists to be the 

 invariable comrade of the human tenants of the tumuli. Again, in the 

 majority of cases, the water-rats' bones were certainly not carried into 

 mounds by a pole-cat, as Prof. Rolleston supposes. Their calvaris are 

 usually intact, and there can be no doubt that the animals hved and died 

 amidst the loose stones of the cairn. Their abundant presence is a strong 

 testimony to the humidity of the climate in ancient times. But such a 

 shortcoming as this is after all insignificant, and the mention of it as a 

 fault will show how few grave errors are to be found in the book. 



Turning to weightier matters we cannot altogether concur in the doubt 

 Canon Greenwell expresses as to whether any of the round barrows are 

 of the Neolithic period. The long barrows have been almost universally 

 attributed to this aera, and the author's conclusion as to his own work, 

 (including fourteen of these mounds,) and the work of others, is that 

 these tumuli belong to a time antecedent to a knowledge of me Lai. The 

 round barrows, however, he seems at the outset to class as all belonging 

 to the Bronze period ; though he afterwards quahfies this view, and, 

 indeed, almost commits himself to the opposite opinion. There can, we 

 think, be but little doubt that a Neolithic period existed in Britain, just 



