Ill 



THE NEANDERTHAL MAN 175 



the presence of dcndrites might be regarded as affording a certain 

 mark of distinction between bones mixed with the diluvium 

 at a somewhat later period and the true diluvial relics, to which 

 alone it was supposed that these deposits were confined. But 

 I have long been convinced that neither can the absence of 

 dcndrites be regarded as indicative of recent age, nor their 

 presence as sufficient to establish the great antiquity of the 

 objects upon which they occur. I have myself noticed upon 

 paper, which could scarcely be more than a year old, dendritic 

 deposits, which could not be distinguished from those on fossil 

 bones. Thus I possess a dog's skull from the Roman colony of 

 the neighbouring Heddersheim, Castrum Hadrianum, which is 

 in no way distinguishable from the fossil bones from the 

 Frankish caves ; it presents the same colour, and adheres to 

 the tongue just as they do ; so that this character also, 

 which, at a former meeting of German naturalists at Bonn, 

 gave rise to amusing scenes between Buckland and Schmerling, 

 is no longer of any value. In disputed cases, therefore, the 

 condition of the bone can scarcely afford the means for deter- 

 mining with certainty whether it be fossil, that is to say, 

 whether it belong to geological antiquity or to the historical 

 period.' 



"As we cannot now look upon the primitive world as repre- 

 senting a wholly different condition of things, from which no 

 transition exists to the organic life of the present time, the 

 designation of fossil, as applied to a bone, has no longer the 

 sense it conveyed in the time of Cuvier. Sufficient grounds 

 exist for the assumption that man coexisted with the animals 

 found in the diluvium ; and many a barbarous race may, before 

 all historical time, have disappeared, together with the animals 

 of the ancient world, whilst the races whose organization is 

 improved have continued, the genus. The bones which form 

 the subject of this paper present characters which, although 

 not decisive as regards a geological epoch, are, nevertheless, 

 such as indicate a very high antiquity. It may also be remarked 

 that, common as is the occurrence of diluvial animal bones in 

 the muddy deposits of caverns, such remains have not hitherto 



