LIFE ON THE EARTH. 49 



Aire, would require thousands of years ; if it were 

 not accumulated under the ordinary circumstances 

 now in operation, but under different geographical 

 conditions, this would perhaps require the hypothesis 

 of still longer time. In the alluvial sediments of this 

 same valley lie nearly complete skeletons of the ex- 

 tinct Hippopotamus major 1 ; in another place jaws 

 and horns of the deer, and hazel wood and nuts, some 

 of them petrified 2 . Perhaps man was contemporary 

 with this extinct Hippopotamus, which has also been 

 found in the Peat deposits of Lancashire. 



The gravel of Amiens and Abbeville appears to 

 furnish evidence of higher antiquity for the flint 

 implements found there, for they lie at the bottom 

 of the deposit, 20 ft. or more in depth. The deposit 

 is of fluviatile origin, but it is not in the bed of the 

 actual valley. It lies in what must have been the 

 course of the great floods of some earlier time, under 

 other geographical conditions, before the actual river- 

 channel was sunk to its present level. In this gravel 

 have been found remains of Elephas primigenius, 

 now extinct. Man may have been contemporary with 

 that animal in Europe ; nor will this appear a very 

 startling inference, if we remember the discovery of 

 the entire specimen covered with flesh and hair at 

 the mouth of the Lena. 



1 British Association Reports, 1853. 2 Phil Mag. 1827, 



R. L. E 



