104 GEOLOGY AND HISTORY 



400 feet in length, and resemble artificial caves ; and 

 there can be no doubt that, as in Belgium, they buried 

 their dead in caves when these were accessible ; and 

 the laborious construction of the long barrows when 

 caves failed is an indication of the great importance 

 they attached to the secure and decent sepulture of 

 the dead. No trace of metal is found in their 

 barrows, and but little pottery, but it is believed that 

 they had at a very early time domesticated sheep and 

 cattle and practised agriculture. These people are 

 now identified with the people of the south and west 

 of England, called by the Romans Silures. They 

 were the builders of the cromlechs, dolmens, and 

 other megalithic structures so common in various 

 parts of the old continent Their type survives to 

 this day in the small dark people of parts of Wales 

 and the south and west of Ireland, and in parts of the 

 Hebrides. Their physical characters connect them 

 with the primitive populations of the hills of Central 

 France, with the Basques of the Pyrenees, the Corsi- 

 cans, the Berbers of Africa, and the Guanches of the 

 Canary Islands, and the term Iberian has been applied 

 to the whole group. Their language was originally 

 not Aryan, but Turanian. They represent not merely 

 a new race still surviving, but a distinct advance in 

 practical civilisation over that of the peoples of the 

 palanthropic age, in Europe at least. 



At the time of the Roman conquest this primitive 

 race had been replaced in the east of England and 

 south of Scotland by a wholly different people, sup- 



