418 TROPICAL NATURE 



north in Norway. A little earlier we find that reindeer 

 were common even in the south of France ; and still earlier 

 this animal was accompanied by the mammoth and woolly 

 rhinoceros, by the arctic glutton, and by huge bears and 

 lions of extinct species. The presence of such animals implies 

 a change of climate ; and both in the caves and gravels we 

 find proofs of a much colder climate than now prevails in 

 Western Europe. Even more remarkable are the changes 

 of the earth's surface which have been effected during man's 

 occupation of it. Many extensive valleys in England and 

 France are believed by the best observers to have been 

 deepened at least a hundred feet ; caverns now far out of the 

 reach of any stream must for a long succession of years have 

 had streams flowing through them, at least in times of 

 floods ; and this often implies that vast masses of solid rock 

 have since been worn away. In Sardinia land has risen at 

 least 300 feet since men lived there who made pottery and 

 probably used fishing-nets ; * while in Kent's Cavern remains 

 of man are found buried beneath two separate beds of 

 stalagmite, each having a distinct texture, and each covering 

 a deposit of cave -earth having well-marked differential 

 characters, while each contains a distinct assemblage of 

 extinct animals. 



Such, briefly, are the results of the evidence that has 

 been rapidly accumulating for about fifteen years, as to 

 the antiquity of man; and it has been confirmed by so 

 many discoveries of a like nature in all parts of the globe, 

 and especially by the comparison of the tools and weapons 

 of prehistoric man with those of modern savages (so that 

 the use of even the rudest flint implements has become 

 quite intelligible), that we can hardly wonder at the vast 

 revolution effected in public opinion. Not only is the 

 belief in man's vast and still unknown antiquity universal 

 among men of science, but it is hardly disputed by any well- 

 informed theologian ; and the present generation of science- 

 students must, we should think, be somewhat puzzled to 

 understand what there was in the earliest discoveries that 

 should have aroused such general opposition, and been met 

 with such universal incredulity. 



1 Lyell's Antiquity of Man, 4th ed., p. 115. 



