Feb. 1 8, 1 875 J 



NATURE 



305 



found resting on the drift in a manner that shows that 

 they were laid there long after the deposition and even 

 subaiirial erosion of the glacial deposits. 



In one cave on the borders of the Lake Mountains it 

 was, and is still, hoped we may find out something more 

 definite about the relation of the palasolitbic to the glacial 

 period. 



In the absence of direct evidence, such as the overlap 

 of boulder-clay over the mouth of the cave or the cave 

 deposits, Prof. Dawkins remarks : " The probable date 

 of the introduction of the contents into ossiferous caves in 

 glaciated areas may be ascertained by an examination of 

 the river deposits. If the animals found in the caves 

 inhabited the surrounding country after the melting of 

 the ice, their remains will occur in the post-glacial gravels. 

 If they are not found, it may be inferred that they had 

 retreated from the district before the latter were depo- 

 sited " (p. 410) ; and, as Mr. Tiddeman has pointed out, 

 there could be no pre-glacial remains in the gravels where 

 there had been glacial erosion, as that must have swept 

 out all the incoherent river deposits. By this test. Prof. 

 Dawkins goes on to say, " the Pleistocene strata in the 

 Victoria Cave, near Settle, may be considered pre-glacial, 

 as well as the hjjena den at Kirkdale " (p. 41 1). 



It was once thought that we were getting the direct 

 evidence we sought for. At the entrance of the Victoria 

 Cave, says Prof. Dawkins, " ice-scratched Silurian grit- 

 stones are imbedded in the clay, which abuts directly on 

 the cave loam, and passes insensibly into the clay, with 

 angular blocks of limestone, within the cave. They may 

 possibly be the constituents of a lateral moraine in situ, 

 as Mr. Tiddeman suggests, or they may merely be derived 

 from the waste of boulder-clay which has dropped from 

 a higher level," — that is, from the broken ground seen 

 in the accompanying sketch on the left of the Victoria 

 Cave. "The latter view seems to me to be most likely 

 to be true, because some of the boulders have been 

 deprived of the clay in which they were imbedded, and 

 are piled on each other with empty space between them, 

 the clay being carried down to a lower level and 

 re-deposited" (p. 121). 



Though we cannot yet make out clearly the relation of 

 man to the glacial period, or explain the gap between 

 palffiolithic and neolithic deposits, this we do know — that 

 man lived in this country and throughout Western Europe 

 with the lion and hairy elephant, the hyasna, and woolly 

 rhinoceros. He was probably more or less nomadic, follow- 

 ing the urus and the elk, and shifting from place to place as 

 they migrated with the seasons. That in his weapons of 

 warfare and the chase he resembled the dwellers on the 

 shores of Arctic seas, and from the associated animals 

 probably lived when continental conditions and higher 

 mountains produced much greater extremes of chmate 

 than are found in the same countries now. In many 

 places he probably followed hard on the receding glaciers, 

 before the advance ol which, perhaps, his ancestors 

 retreated. That although we cannot assign a date to his 

 first or last appearance, we must refer him to a period 

 so remote that wide valleys have been scooped out and 

 whole races of animals have been exterminated since 

 his time, but how long it took to bring this about we 

 cannot yet tell. 



Prof. Dawkins having qualified himself for the study by 



acquiring an intimate knowledge of the osteology of the 

 animals apt to be found in such places, has been long 

 engaged in collecting the evidence which caves furnish 

 as to the early inhabitants of Europe, and has given us 

 the result of his researches in a very readable volume, 

 which, we doubt not, will reach another edition, and re- 

 appear with the correction of many small inaccuracies 

 and inconsistencies, such as would be likely to occur in 

 putting together the evidence collected through a series 

 of years, during which Prof. Dawkins' own views were 

 undergoing some change as new evidence was forth- 

 coming, and the researches and views of other observers 

 were being brought before him. 



OUR BOOK SHELF 



The Descent of Man, and Selection in relation to Sex. 

 By Charles Darwin, JNI.A., F.R.S. Second Edition, 

 revised and augmented. Pp. 688. (Murray : 1874.) 



Since the first edition of this great work was reviewed in 

 these pages (Nature, vol. iii., pp. 442, 463), it has been 

 repeatedly reprinted without any important change. But 

 the new issue differs, not only in form, but also in many 

 important additions, from the first. In spite of the added 

 material, the whole work is now comprised in a single 

 volume scarcely larger than one of the previous two. 

 For this purpose the print has been much coxnpressed, 

 and the paper is thinner. The leaves have also been cut. 

 So that although in some respects more convenient, the 

 present form is less pleasing than the original one. We 

 would suggest the desirableness of publishing a library 

 edition of this and Mr. Darwin's other works, uniform 

 with "Animals and Plants under Domestication," so that 

 the opera omnia of our great biologist may stand ranged 

 in a well-ordered row, printed in legible type with ample 

 margin on opaque paper, fit to be clad in the sober 

 dignity of russia. The present volume looks more like a 

 school cram-book than a treatise which makes a generation 

 illustrious. A prospectus has just reached us from Stutt- 

 gart of a German translation of the works of Mr. Darwin, 

 by Victor Carus, to be published in numbers, with photo- 

 graphic and woodcut illustrations, portrait, indices, &c., 

 and to be completed in ten handsome volumes. It would 

 surely not be creditable were there to be no corresponding 

 edition in English. 



A list of the principal additions and corrections made 

 in this edition of the " Descent of Man " is prefixed, and 

 shows at a glance that the most important additions have 

 been on the subject of Sexual Selection. 



The whole treatise is now divided into three parts : 

 The Descent of Man ; Sexual Selection generally ; and 

 Sexual Selection in relation to Man. The two some- 

 what disjointed sections of the original work are thus 

 combined into more of an organic unity. Beside in- 

 numerable references to the vast literature bearing on the 

 subject scattered through the periodicals and books of 

 travel of the civilised world, there is an important contri- 

 bution by Prof. Huxley, on the resemblances and differ- 

 ences between the brain of man and that of apes, which 

 occupies seven closely-printed pages. This and other 

 valuable additions make this edition necessary to bio- 

 logists as a work of reference, though most will probably 

 prefer the earlier one for reading. P. S. 



Manuals of Elementary Science.": Zoology. By Alfred 

 Newton, F.R.S. (Society for Promoting Christian 

 Knowledge, 1875.) 

 A bird's eye view of a science from the hand of one who, 

 during many years, has devoted most of his thinking tirne 

 to the investigation of its principles and details, is certain 

 to have a vigour and freshness about it which must be as 



