132 



THE WONDERFUL CENTURY. 



in excavations near Gray's Inn Lane, along with the 

 skeleton of an elephant. In 1800 another discovery 

 was made in Suffolk of flint weapons and the remains of 

 extinct animals in the same deposits. In 1825 Mr. 

 McEnery, of Torquay, discovered worked flints along 

 with the bones and teeth of extinct animals in Kent's 

 cavern. In 1840 a good geologist confirmed these dis- 

 coveries, and sent an account of them to the Geological 

 Society of London, but the paper was rejected as being 

 too improbable for publication! All these discoveries 

 were laughed at or explained away, as the glacial striae 

 and grooves so beautifully exhibited in the Vale of Llan- 

 berris were at first endeavored to be explained as the 

 wheel-ruts caused by the chariots of the ancient Britons ! 

 These, combined with numerous other cases of the denial 

 of facts on a priori grounds, have led me to the conclu- 

 sion that, whenever the scientific men of any age disbe- 

 lieve other men's careful observations without inquiry, 

 the scientific men are always wrong. 



Even after these evidences of man's great antiquity 

 were admitted, strenuous efforts were made to minimize 

 the time as measured by years; and it was maintained 

 that man, although undoubtedly old, was entirely post- 

 glacial. But evidence has been steadily accumulating 

 of his existence at the time of the glacial epoch, and 

 even before it; while two discoveries of recent date seem 

 to carry back his age far into pre-glacial times. These 

 are, first, the human cranium, bones, and works of art 

 which have been found more than a hundred feet deep 

 in the gold-bearing gravels of California, associated with 

 abundant vegetable remains of extinct species, and over- 

 laid by four successive lava streams from long extinct 



