496 ANNUAL REPORT SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION, 1&23 



within your territory. From the geological point of view, your Plio- 

 cene and Pleistocene formations are most varied; you have marine 

 formations, glacial formations, alluvial formations, accretional de- 

 posits, bone caverns, peat bogs, etc. The study of the stratigraphic 

 relations of these diverse formations led you early to particularly 

 interesting and accurate results. It is certain, for instance, that the 

 early observations of Lyell and of Prestwich still remain of prime 

 importance. 



From the paleontological point of view, you have, in your Pliocene 

 outcrops of Norfolk, in the Pleistocene alluvial formations of your 

 great valleys, in the refuse deposits of your caves, in your peat bogs, 

 etc., an almost uninterrupted succession of fossil faunas whose study, 

 connected with a stratigraphic study, is of a nature singularly 

 adapted to the solution of chronological problems. 



From the archeological point of view, your situation is somewhat 

 peculiar, but it is found that at different epochs, the connection of 

 your country with the continent has provided access to it for the 

 oldest populations of western Europe, so that you do not lack evidence 

 bearing on the ethnography of these early men, and you are able 

 also, perhaps better than elsewhere, to establish the most instructive 

 relations between all the data of geology, of paleontology, and of pre- 

 historic archeology. 



Such a subject would therefore have much attraction for me; but 

 to treat it suitably before you, I should have had to devote to its 

 preparation much more time that my professional duties will permit. 

 I was still hesitating when there occurred a tragic event, the death of 

 Prince Albert I of Monaco, whose name will live, as you know, as one 

 of the greatest benefactors of science, and of whom I had the honor 

 of being one of the closest collaborators. Everyone knows to-day 

 the services which the prince has rendered to oceanography. Much 

 less well known, though not less great, are the services which he has 

 rendered to human paleontology. It seemed to me that I should be 

 able to interest you in speaking to you of an illustrious and mourned 

 benefactor of anthropology, and that I would fulfill a duty in paying 

 to his memory, before a select audience, the homage which is due him. 

 The anthropological work accomplished by the Prince or by his col- 

 laborators is such that in describing it I shall be able at the same 

 time to indicate to you the greater part of the progress recently made 

 in France in the field of human paleontology. 



What I especially desire to explain to you is that the part played 

 by the Prince of Monaco was not that of a mere amateur nor of a mere 

 patron. He brought to the study of the great problem of the origin 

 of the human race the enthusiasm, and especially the spirit of coopera- 

 tion which he showed in his oceanographic investigations, in attack- 



