202 GEOLOGY AND HISTORY 



This was the time of the so-called glacial period in 

 Western Europe. 



This, however, was succeeded by that post-glacial 

 period in which, as already explained, the area of 

 the Mediterranean was much smaller than at present, 

 and the land encroached far upon the bed of the sea. 

 This, the second continental period, is that in which 

 man makes his first undoubted appearance in Europe, 

 and we have evidence of the same kind in Syria, 

 to which I have already directed attention in the 

 description of the caverns of the Lebanon, in 

 Chapter IV. 



That the occupancy of these caves is very ancient 

 is proved by the fact that the old Egyptian con- 

 querors, who cut a road for themselves over these 

 precipices before the Exodus, seem to have found 

 them in the same state as at present, while farther 

 south ancient Syrian tombs are excavated in similar 

 bone breccias. But there is better evidence than this. 

 The bones and teeth in these caves belong not to the 

 animals which have inhabited the Lebanon in historic 

 times, but to creatures like the hairy rhinoceros and 

 the bison, now extinct, which could not have lived in 

 this region since the comparatively modern period in 

 which the Mediterranean resumed its dominion over 

 that great plain between Phoenicia and Cyprus. This 

 we know had been submerged long before the first 

 migrations of the Himites into Phoenicia, even before 

 the entrance of those comparatively rude tribes which 

 seem to have inhabited the country before the Phceni- 



