tion, but must have lived either in pre-glacial times, or, 

 in other words, at the end of Pleiocene or very beginning 

 of Pleistocene times, or else in inter-glacial or mid- 

 Pleistocene times ; and whichever alternative be adopted 

 we are bound to fix the date of the Palaeolithic remains 

 at the same period. To fix their date in the very earliest 

 of Pleistocene, or latest of Pleiocene times, would give 

 them an antiquity of nearly 300,000 years ; to fix it in 

 mid-Pleistocene times, during the temperate or inter- 

 glacial period of submergence, would give them an anti- 

 quity of upwards of 170,000 years ; and to fix it in post- 

 glacial times would give them an antiquity of probably 

 70,000 or 80,000 years at most. The inter-glacial theory 

 would, on the whole, appear most likely to be the correct 

 one, were it not for the fact that, during the inter-glacial 

 period, this country was partially submerged, which would 

 probably have prevented any communication in those 

 times between the islands and the mainland. We must, 

 however, not forget that the great submergence com- 

 menced during the first period of glaciation, and did not 

 cease until the second period had been reached, so that 

 the inter-glacial period of warmth would take place when 

 England and Scotland were but little different from now 

 in their relationship to the continent, and long before the 

 archipelago was formed. Whether it would have been 

 possible under these conditions for Palaeolithic man to 

 cross from the continent to the British islands we cannot 

 say ; but the probability is that the distance to travel by 

 water would have been far too great in such early times ; 

 in which case we have no alternative but to place the 

 date of man's earliest existence in England at the latest 

 Pleiocene age, as indeed we are compelled to do by the 

 fact that Palaeolithic implements have been found in 

 Kent's cavern side by side with teeth of the extinct bear 

 of that period, as well as by the discoveries made in the 

 Engis and other caves. 



In Southern Europe and the Southern States of North 

 America the glacial epoch had little effect, so that man's 

 age upon the earth in those districts will be better calcu- 

 lated than it can ever be here or in France and Belgium ; 

 and it will not be surprising if we learn before long that 

 man lived in the districts surrounding the Mediterranean 



