PHYSICAL CHARACTERISTICS OF PRE-HISTORIC MEN. 201 



I would say that there is no good reason to regard 

 the first man as having resembled a Greek Apollo or 

 an Adonis. He was probably of sterner and more 

 muscular mould. But the gigantic Palaeolithic men of 

 the European caves are more probably representatives 

 of that fearful and powerful race who filled the ante- 

 diluvian world with violence, and who re-appear in 

 post-diluvian times as the Anakim and traditional 

 giants, who constitute a feature in the early history 

 of so many countries. Perhaps nothing is more 

 curious in the revelations as to the most ancient 

 cave-men, than that they confirm the old belief that 

 there were (e giants in those days." 



And now let us pause for a moment to picture these 

 so-called Palaeolithic men. What could the old man 

 of Cro-magnon have told us, had we been able to sit 

 by his hearth, and listen understandingly to his 

 speech, which, if we may judge from the form of his 

 palate bones, must have resembled more that of the 

 Americans or Mongolians than of any modern Euro- 

 pean people ? He had, no doubt, travelled far, for to 

 his stalwart limbs a long journey through forests and 

 over plains and mountains would be a mere pastime. 

 He may have bestridden the wild horse which seems 

 to have abounded at the time in France, and he may 

 have launched his canoe on the waters of the Atlantic. 

 His experience and memory might ^extend back a 

 century or more, and his traditional lore might even 

 reach to the times of the first mother of our race. Did 

 he live in that wide Post-pliocene continent which 



