THE BRITISH ASSOCIATION AT TORONTO. 41 



vast continent on the lines of Anglo-Saxon civilization. An en- 

 forced and uncongenial union could have no benefit for either 

 people. 



In welcoming the association at the civic reception on "Wednes- 

 day afternoon, previous to the opening of the meeting, speeches were 

 made by Lord Aberdeen, for the Dominion Government, and Mr. 

 Shaw, the mayor, for the city the Governor of Ontario, who was 

 to represent the province, being unwell and not present. Mayor 

 Shaw, alluding to the American visitors, expressed the feeling of 

 the Canadians very aptly by saying: " They mingle with our people 

 on the friendliest of terms; we are delighted to have them come, 

 and sorry when they go away. They are our good neighbors the 

 Americans but they are only our neighbors. You are more closely 

 related; you are our own kith and kin, . . . though separated by 

 three thousand miles of ocean." 



President Evans's address dealt, first, with archaeology as a sci- 

 ence ; he drew a strong distinction between archaeology and " anti- 

 quarianism," and developed clearly the relations that must exist be- 

 tween archaeology, geology, and palaeontology, in order to results 

 of any established value. Then, reviewing the history of the sci- 

 ence, in which he referred to the fact that the term " prehistoric " 

 was first employed by the late Sir Daniel Wilson, President of the 

 University of Toronto, he passed on to consider its scope. With 

 regard to all questions of human remains or traces prior to the 

 Glacial time, in the Pliocene or earlier, he could see no evidences at 

 all trustworthy, and many elements of serious doubt. But, " when 

 we return to palaeolithic man," he said, " it is satisfactory to feel 

 that we are treading on comparatively secure ground, and that the 

 discoveries of the last forty years in Britain alone enable us to a 

 great extent to reconstitute his history." He dwelt at length on the 

 enormous amount of physical change that has taken place in the face 

 of the country since the earlier palaeolithic remains were deposited 

 in the gravel beds and caves, and the immense lapse of time thereby 

 indicated. Passing to the question of the origin of palaeolithic man, 

 he emphasized the view that he must have reached Britain and north- 

 ern Europe by migration from a more genial climate, where food 

 was more abundant and clothing less needful, rather than have 

 originated in that inhospitable subarctic region. He then pointed 

 out the wide diffusion of precisely similar implements to those of 

 the Thames and the Somme Valleys, through numerous points of 

 discovery in the Mediterranean region, into northern Africa south- 

 ward even to Somaliland, and eastward through the valleys of the 

 Nile and of the Euphrates to the Narbudda Valley in India. Here 

 they are associated with a Pleistocene fauna, closely akin to that of 



YOL. LII. 4 



