208 

sible. Stout Indians will howl and writhe with agony 
from the effect of their bites. A minute red fire ant also 
infests the acacia trees, and is barely more endurable. The 
howling of the black monkeys also is not conducive to 
sleep when they choose some neighbouring branches for 
their “serenade.” The above slight sketch may serve to 
give some insight into the pleasures of a country life in 
the vicinity of Greytown, pleasures, however, of which 
the Nicaraguan citizens seldom avail themselves, 
There have already appeared in NATURE some accounts 
of peculiar nocturnal vibrations observable in iron vessels 
off Greytown, which I will not allude to further. 
The drawing which accompanies this notice was taken 
from the pier of the Transit Company’s wharf ; the town 
itself is barely visible from this point, and lies beyond the 
few buildings shown. The remains of one of the flat- 
bottomed streamers which ascend the river is shown lying 
by the shore. Canon Kingsley appears to have been 
disappointed at only twice catching a glimpse of the black 
fin of a shark during his recent visit to the West Indies ; 
let me recommend the bar of Greytown Harbour and its 
vicinity as an exceptionally favourable locality for study- 
ing these monsters in their native element. 
S. P. OLIVER 

THE DATE OF THE INTERMENT IN THE 
AURIGNAC CAVE 
T is a remarkable fact in the history of Archeo- 
logy that the paleolithic age of the human inter- 
ments in the cave of Aurignac has been universally 
accepted without any criticism of the evidence. It has 
passed into the condition of an article of scientific faith, 
partly through the eminence of M. Lartet, the describer of 
the cave, and partly through the high authority of Sir 
Charles Lyell, who followed his views in the “ Antiquity 
of Man.” The ready faith with which it has been re- 
ceived stands in marked contrast to the scepticism which 
refused to allow the value of the discovery of flint imple- 
ments in the caves of England and Belgium for more than 
a quarter of a century, and up to within some three years 
of M. Lartet’s investigations in Aurignac. The impor- 
tance of examining the data on which M. Lartet’s theory 
is based can hardly be over-estimated in the present state 
of the science of man, If the human interments really be 
of the same relative date as the extinct Mammalia found 
in the cave, and M., Lartet’s interpretation of the circum- 
stances be true, then, to quote Sir Charles Lyell, “ we have 
at last succeeded in tracing back the sacred rites of 
burial, and, more interesting still, a belief in the future 
state,” to the paleolithic age, and we have a powerful 
argument against the progressive development of religious 
ideas. This point did not escape Mr. Wallace in his 
speech at the Exeter meeting of the British Association. 
If, on the other hand, the interments be not proved to be 
palolithic, the sooner an element of error is eliminated 
from a most difficult problem, the nearer shall we be to its 
solution. I shall first of all take the facts as they are now 
universally interpreted ; and then I shall check them by 
the independent evidence of the late Rev. S. W. King, 
who finally explored the cave. 
M. Lartet’s account falls naturally into two parts: first 
that which the original discoverer of the case told him, 
and secondly that in which he describes the results of his 
own discoveries. I shall begin with the first. In the year 
1852 a labourer named Bonnemaison, employed in mend- 
ing the roads, put his hand into a rabbit-hole and drew 
out a human bone, and, having his curiosity excited, he 
dug down, until, as his story goes, he came to a great 
slab of rock. Having removed this, he discovered on 
the other side of ita cavity 7 or § feet in height, 10 in 
width, and 7 in depth, almost full of human bones, 
which Dr, Amiel, the Mayor of Aurignac, believed to 
an ae eee 
NATURE 


human remains were collected, and finally committed to 
the parish cemetery, where they rest at the present time 
undisturbed by the sacrilegious hands of archzologists, 
the discoverer and the sexton being alike ignorant of their 
last resting-place. Fortunately, however, Bonnemaison, 
in digging his way into the grotto, had met with the remains 
of extinct animals and works of art, and these were pre- 
served until, in 1860, M. Lartet heard of the discovery, 
and resolved to examine the cave for himself. It must 
be remarked that before his advent the interior had been 
ransacked, and the original stratification to a great extent 
disturbed, a circumstance which obviously does away with 
any argument based on the association of remains in the 
cave. 
M. Lartet’s exploration resulted in the discovery that a 
stratum containing the bones of cave-bear, lion, rhinoceros, 
and hyena, along with undisputable works of art of the 
palzeolithic type—like those of the Dordogne—passed from 
a plateau on the outside into the cave. On the outside he 
met with ashes and burnt and split bones, which implied 
that it had been used by the palzeolithic hunters asa 
feasting place ; within he detected no traces of charcoal, 
and no traces of hyznas, which were abundant outside. 
Inside he met with a few human bones, which were in the 
same mineral state as those of the extinct Mammalia, 
That, however, identity of mineral state is any clue 
to age is disproved by the varying condition of bones of 
the same geological age in every bone cave with which I 
am acquainted. As an example I might quote the re- 
remains of cave-lion in the Taunton Museum, Such is 
the summary of the facts which M. Lartet discovered. 
He has, of his personal knowledge, only proved that 
Aurignac was occupied by a hunter tribe during the 
paleolithic age. 
Is he further justified in assuming that it was used 
as a sepulchre at that remote period? Bonnemaison’s 
recollections may be estimated at the proper value by 
the significant fact that, in the short space of eight 
years intervening between the discovery and the ex- 
ploration, he had forgotten where the skeletons had 
been buried. And even if his account be true in the 
minutest detail, it does not afford a shred of evidence 
in favour of the cave having been a place of sepulture 
in palzolothic times, but merely that it had been 
so used at some time or other. If we turn to the 
diagram constructed by M. Lartet to illustrate his views 
(An. des Sc. Nat. Zool. iv. ser. t. xv., pl. 10), and made 
for the most part from Bonnemaison’s recollection, or to 
the amended diagram given by Sir C. Lyell (Antiquity, 
fig. 25), we shall see that the skeletons are depicted above 
the strata containing the palzolithic implements and the 
quaternary mammals, and therefore, according to the laws 
of geological evidence, they must have been buried after 
the subjacent deposit was accumulated. The previous dis- 
turbance of the cave earth altogether does away with the 
value of the conclusion that the few human _ bones 
found by M., Lartet are of the same age as the extinct 
mammialia in the same deposit. The absence of charcoal 
inside was quite as likely to be due to the obvious fact 
that a fire kindled inside would fill the grotto with smoke, 
while outside the paleolithic savages could feast in com- 
parative comfort, as to the view that the ashes are those 
of funereal feasts in honour of the dead within, held after 
the slab had been placed at-the entrance. The absence of 
the remains of hyenas from the interior is also negative 
evidence disproved by subsequent examination. 
The researches of the Rev. S. W. King in 1865, hitherto 
unpublished, complete the case against the current view of 
the palzeolithic character of the interments, insomuch as 
they show that M, Lartet did not complete the examination 
which he began ; and that he consequently wrote without 
being in posesssion of all the facts. The entrance was 
blocked up, according to Bonnemaison, by a slab of stone 
[Kuly 13, 1870 
represent at least 17 individuals of all ages. All these 


—s 
ons 
