ON PRIMITIVE MAN : I. HIS TIMES AND HIS COMPANIONS. 265 



covered the gravels in valleys — that glaciers from the sierra 

 succeeded and wore down what had been hill-raJiges between the 

 old valleys, and in time left the hard lava-beds as ridges with the 

 protected gravels beneath them. The only possible reduction of 

 the time apparently necessary for the extinction and burial of the 

 great Pliocene quadrupeds mentioned — for the lava-flows — and 

 for the subsequent denudation of the lines of country not pro- 

 tected by lava, is the suggested continuance of Pliocene conditions 

 of life to a late period on the borders of the Great Valley of 

 California when it was a Pleistocene gulf, that is, while elsewhere 

 Pleistocene conditions had come in force; and that glacial con- 

 ditions followed there later than elsewhere. The great lapse of 

 time reqiiired for the climatal changes, and the resulting altera- 

 tions of the land, may well have equalled any calculable period 

 for the changes in Western Europe connected with the appearance 

 of man and the disappearance of the great quadrupeds — probably 

 not much less than 20,000 years ago. 



For my part I do not see the necessity for regarding the 

 Pleistocene as very widely separated from the Pliocene times 

 (speaking geologically), nor the existence of Neolithic man from 

 that of his Palaeolithic forerunners ; and, although the majority of 

 known Palseolithic implements are larger than the Neoliths, and 

 somewhat differently prepared, I prefer to think that they do not 

 indicate veiy different races of men. 



The Rev. A. Irving, D.S.C, B.A., F.G.S., writes :— 

 Having perused with much interest the excellent paper (in 

 proof) by Mr. Mello, I am inclined to regard the question of the 

 evidence of the presence of man upon this globe in Tertiary times 

 as the most important point in it. Mr. Mello may be said to have 

 effectually disposed of most of such alleged evidence as has been 

 brought into court up to the present ; but he finds, and candidly 

 admits, an appaa-ent difficulty in the statement " by M. Rames 

 with regard to the flints found by him at Puy-Courny . . . 

 that the supposed implements are all made out of one particular 

 variety, whilst there are other kinds of flint in the same bed." 

 M. Rames, it appears, " concludes from this, that the selection 

 must have been made intentionally by an intelligent being." 



With all due deference to the judgment of M. Rames, who has 

 the advantage of having seen and handled the fragments in 

 question, I may be allowed to urge that there are several con- 

 siderations which appear to make such a conclusion altogether 



