336 BIMANA. 



One thing, however, is clear, 'that, at the period when our Continent 

 had assumed its present general form, it was the abode of species of Mam- 

 malia which have passed away, and whose representatives now live only 

 in the hotter regions of the globe. The circumstances attendant upon 

 their deposition in these caves, where they are often found in recesses, 

 the entrance to which could not have admitted the living animal, involve 

 many speculations : but the subject is alien to our present purpose ; nor 

 do we profess to be ajjle to throw more light upon it than has been done 

 by our learned and zealous geologists. 



We may here allude to the fossil human relics found near Kosritz, 

 and said to have been discovered consolidated in the limestone rock, 

 together with the remains of the Rhinoceros, Lion, Hyaena, &c. M. de 

 Sclotheim, by whom these organic remains were discovered, throws a 

 doubt upon this point, and considers the human bones to have been de- 

 posited at a later epoch than the bones of the animals referred to, and 

 in this opinion he is borne out by Dr. Buckland, who observes, that " the 

 case of Kosritz affords no exception to the general fact, that human bones 

 have not been discovered in any of those diluvial deposits which have 

 hitherto been examined." 



The discovery of human bones in peat-bogs, in tumuli of unknown 

 antiquity, in mines, &c., does not bear upon the present subject. 



The opinion, then, of the best informed and most observant geologists, 

 is, that Man is of recent creation, that he was called into being when 

 the surface of the earth, having undergone a series of modifications, and 

 having assumed, on a broad scale, its present aspect, became fitted for 

 his reception. Against the opinion of his comparatively modern date, 

 some philosophers have brought the chronological records of the Chinese 

 and Brahmins, and the presumed zodiacs of the ancient Egyptians. With 

 respect to the fabulous chronology of the Chinese and the Brahmins, it 

 is unworthy of serious notice, as evidence in the case. With respect to 

 the zodiacs of the Egyptians, it is now, we believe, admitted, that the 

 great temple of Dendera, whence the celebrated zodiac, now in Paris, 

 was obtained, is not anterior to tjie time of Augustus : the small temple 

 of Esne, that of which the origin, as indicated by the zodiac there dis- 

 covered, was, according to the lowest calculation, near 3,000 years 

 anterior to the Christian era, has a column sculptured and painted in the 

 sixth year of Antonine, 147 years after Christ ; and it is painted and 

 sculptured in the same style as the zodiac which is near it. 



These celebrated planispheres have been the test to which many 

 philosophers have, as they thought, triumphantly appealed, in favour 

 of the antiquity of our race. Dapius referred the construction of the 

 zodiac of Dendera to an era 13,000 years before the present : and others, 

 of no little learning, have fallen into conclusions as extravagant. After 



