ANTIQUITY OF MAN. 237 



English caves and gravels may have been protected by 

 a coating of fat like the walrus, or of hair like that 

 of the seals. The elevated land of Post-glacial Europe, 

 if it were partly clothed with forests, and partly grassy 

 plains, would have precisely the climatal properties 

 which we know in America and Asia favour the inter- 

 mixture of the animals of different latitudes. Again, 

 that so-called Palaeolithic implements are not found 

 over the boulder deposits of North Britain is merely 

 a consequence of the fact that they are in the main 

 limited to the chalk and flint districts, a circumstance 

 which, as already hinted, throws grave doubts on 

 their being even so ancient as usually supposed, and 

 gives them a local rather than a chronological charac- 

 ter. Further, in Eastern America we know that the 

 higher condition of the land immediately preceding 

 the Modern period was accompanied by a milder 

 climate than that which now prevails, and that this 

 occurred after the close of the Glacial period.* I 

 must, therefore, reject this supposed later Glacial age 

 intervening between Paleolithic and Modern man, 

 and maintain that there is no proof of the existence of 

 man earlier than the close of the proper Glacial age. 



Some remarkable evidence has lately been found, 

 bearing on the climate of Europe when occupied by 

 the Post-glacial men, and showing that some measure 

 of the rigours of the cold period still continued after 

 their appearance. The presence of the reindeer, musk- 



* "Notes on Post-Pliocene of Canada," by the Author, 

 Montreal. 



