THE MISSING LINK 279 



between the large-brained, small-jawed man and the 

 small-brained, large-jawed ape. The link was missing. 

 It was hoped, when in 1859 the human workmanship 

 of the flint axes found with the bones of extinct animals 

 in our river gravels was recognized, that the bones of the 

 men who made the flint axes would turn up alongside of 

 them, and that they would show characters intermediate 

 between those of modern man and the great apes. But 

 no such human bones ever were found in the older 

 gravels deposited as terraces along their beds by the 

 rivers of Western Europe. Human bones, and more 

 or less complete human skulls, of a highly-developed 

 modern type (the Cromagnards) were found in caves 

 associated with flint tools of a different character to 

 those common in river gravels. Then we heard a good 

 deal about the strangely flat skull-top, or calvaria, found 

 in a cave near Dusseldorf on the Rhine, associated with 

 the preaching of a certain hermit named " Neuman " 

 ( = Neander). The valley was called " the Neanderthal," 

 and the skull-top thus came to be called the " Neander- 

 thal skull." Some authorities regarded the Neanderthal 

 skull as that of an outcast idiot ! Huxley studied it 

 minutely, and compared it to that of Southern Australian 

 black-fellows, and held that it took us no nearer to the 

 apes than they did. Then an unsatisfactory small flat skull- 

 top, together with a long, straight thigh-bone, was found 

 in a gravel in Java, and the name " Pithecanthropus " 

 was applied to these remains. Still we had got no 

 nearer to any knowledge of the missing link. 



Of late years we have, however, learnt a great deal 

 more about the race or species of men of which the 

 Neanderthal skull-top was the first indication. We 

 now know that this species of man belonged to a period 

 older than that of the other prehistoric cavemen — -the 



