August 31, 1882] 



NA TURE 



437 



7 he River-drift Man in India. — The researches of Foote, 

 King, Medlicott, Hacket, and Ball, establish the fact that the 

 River-drift hunter ranged over the Indian peninsula from Madras 

 as far north as the valley of the Nerbudda. Here we find him 

 Arming part of a fauna in which there are specie- DOW living in 

 India, such as the Indian rhinoceros and the arnee, and extinct 

 types of oxen and elephants. There were two extinct hi popotami 

 in the rivers, and living gavials, turtles, and tortoises. It is plain, 

 therefore, that at this time the fauna of India stood in the 'ame 

 relation to the present fauna as the European fauna of the late 

 Pleistocene does to that now living in Europe. In both there 

 was a similar association of extinct and living forms, from both 

 the genus Hippopotamus has disappeared in the lapse of time, and 

 in both man forms the central figure. 



The River-dr ft Hunter in North Amelia. — We are led from 

 the region of tropical India to the banks of the Delaware in New 

 Jersey by the recent discoveries of Mr. C. C. Abbott in the 

 neighbourhood of Trenton. After a study of his collections in 

 the I'eabody Museum in Cambridge, Mass. , I have had the 

 opportunity of examining all the specimens found up to that time, 

 and of visiting the locality in company v. ith Dr. Abbott and 

 Professors llaynes and Lewis. The implements are of the same 

 type as those of the river gravels of Europe, and occur under 

 exactly the same conditi ins as tho e of France and Britain. Tbey 

 are found in a plateau of river gravel firming a terrace over- 

 looking the river, and composed of material- washed down from 

 the old terminal moraine which strikes across the State of New- 

 Jersey to the westward. The large blocks of stone and the general 

 character of the gravel point out that during the time of its accu- 

 mula ion there were ice-rafts floating down the Delaware in the 

 spring, as in the Thames, the Seine, and the Souime. According 

 to Professor Lewis it was firmed during the time when the glacier 

 of the Delc-waie was retreating ('late glacial'), or at a later 

 period (' post-glacial '). The physical evidence is clear that it 

 belongs to the same age as deposits with similar remains in 

 Britain. The animal remains also point to the same conclusion. 

 A tusk of mastodon is in Dr. Cooke's collection at Brunswick, 

 New Jersey, obtained from the gravel, and I hr. Abbott rec >rds 

 the tooth of a reindeer and the bones of a bison from Trenton. 

 Here, too, living and extinct species are found side by side. 



Thus in our survey of the group of animals surrounding man 

 when he first appeared in Europe, India, and North America, 

 we -ee that in all three regions, so widely removed from each 

 other, the animal life was in the same stage of evolution, and 

 ■ the old order' was yielding ' place unto the new.' The River- 

 drift man is proved by his surroundings to belong to the 

 Pleistocene age in all three. 



The evidence of Pake olithic man in South Africa seems to me 

 unsatisfactory, because as yet the age of the deposits in which 

 the implements are found lias not been decided. 



General Conclusions. — It remains now for us to sum up the re- 

 sults of thi- inquiry, in which we have been led very far afield. 

 The identity of the implements of the River-drift hunter proves 

 that he was in the same rude state of civilisation, if it en be 

 called civilisation, in the Old and New Worlds, when the hands of 

 the geological clock pointed to the same hour. It is not a lit'le 

 strange that his mode of life should have been the same in the 

 forests to the north and south of the Mediterranean, in Palestine, 

 in the tropical forests of India, and on the western shores of the 

 Atlantic. The hunter of the reindeer in the v illey of the Delaware 

 wa- to all intents and purposes the same sort of savage as the 

 hnnter of the reindeer on the banks of the Wiley orof the Solent. 

 It does not, however, follow that this identity of implements im- 

 plies that the same race of men were spread over this vast tract. 

 It points rather to a primeval condition of savagery from which 

 mankind has emerged in the long ages which separate it from 

 our own time. 



It may further be inferred, from his wide-spread range, that 

 the Kiver-drift man (assuming that mankind sprang from one 

 centre) must have inhabited the earth for a long time, and that 

 his dispersal took place before the glacial submergence ard the 

 lowering of the temperature in Northern Europe, Asia, and 

 America. It is not reasonable to suppo-e that the Straits of 

 Behring would have offered a free passage, either to the River- 

 drift man from Asia to America, or to American animals from 

 America to Europe, or vice versa*, while there was a vast barrier 

 of ice or of sea, or of both, in the high northern latitudes. 



I therefore feel inclined to view the Kiver-drift hunter as having 

 invaded Europe in pre-glacial times along with the other living 

 species which then appeared. The evidence, as I have already 



pointed out, is conclusive that he was also glacial and post- 

 glacial. 



In all probability the birthplace of man was in a warm if not 

 a tropical region of Asia, in 'a garden of Eden,' and from this 

 the Kiver-drift man found his way into those regions where his 

 implements occur. In India he was a member of a tropical 

 fauna, and his distribution in Europe and along the shores of the 

 Mediterranean prove him to have bel inged either to the temperate 

 or the southern fauna in those regions. 



It will naturally be asked, to what race can the River-drift 

 man be referred ? The question, in my opinion, cannot be 

 answered in the present st >ge of the inquiry, because the few 

 fragments of human bones discovered along with the implements 

 are too imperfect to afford any clue. Nor can we measure the 

 interval in terms of years which separates the Kiver-drift man 

 from the present day, either by assuming that the glacial period 

 was due to astronomical causes, and then proceeding to calculate 

 the time necessary for them to produce their result, or by an 

 appeal to the erosion of valleys or the retrocession of waterfalls. 

 The interval must, however, have been very great to allow of the 

 clanges in geography anl climate, and the distribution of animals 

 which has taken place — the succes-ion of races, and the develop- 

 ment of civilisation before history began. Standing before the 

 rock hewn tombs of the kings at Luxor, we may realise the 

 impossibility of fixing the time when the Kiver-drift hunter lived 

 on the site of ancient Thebes, or of measuring the lapse of time 

 between his clays and the splendour of the civilisation of 

 Egypt. 



In this inquiry, which is all too long, I fear, for my audience 

 and all too short, 1 know, for my subject, I have purposely 

 omitted all reference to the successor of the River-drift man in 

 Europe — the Cave man, who was in a higher stage of the hunter 

 civilisation. In the course of my remarks you will have seen 

 that the story told by the rudely chipped implements found at 

 our very doors in this place, firms a part of the wider story of 

 the first ap; earance of man, and of his distribution on the earth 

 — a story « hich is to my mind not unfitting as an introduction 

 to the work of the Anthropological Section at this meeting of 

 the British Association. 



SECTION E 



Geography 



Opening Address by Sir Kichard Temple, Bart., G.C.S.I., 



D.C.L., I.R.G.S., President of the Section 



The Central Plateau 0/ Asia 



The subject chosen fir this acldre-s is the Plateau of mid- Asia. 

 This area, which is one of the most wonderful on the surface of 

 the earth, contains nearly 3,000,000 of English square miles, 

 and is equal to three-fourths of Europe. Its limits, its exterior 

 configuration, its central and commanding situation in the Asiatic 

 continent, will be clearly perceived from the large diagram of 

 Asia which is exhibited here. As compared with some of the 

 more favoured regions, it is singularly destitute of natural advan- 

 tages. Though it ha- several deep depressions of surface, yet 

 its general elevation is very con-iderable, and some of its Iarc'e 

 districts are the most elevated in the globe. It is walled in from 

 the outer world and excluded from the benign influences of the 

 sea by mountain chains Its climate then is very severe on the 

 whole, mire distinguished for cold than for heat, but often dis- 

 playing extremes of temperature high as well as low. It offers, 

 from the character of its contour, extraordinary obstacles to 

 communication by land or water. Though seldon inaccessible 

 to courageous explorers, it is generally hard of access, and in 

 several re-pects very inhospitable. In the progress of civilisation 

 it is, with reference to i's historic past, excessively backward. 

 Its capacities for the production of wealth have been but little 

 developed. Its population is scanty, scattered, and uncultured. 

 Its agriculture comprises: only a few areas widely segregated 

 from each other, and many of its largest districts are amazingly 

 desolate. 



Nevertheless this plateau has eminent claims on the attention 

 of geographers, for several reasons which may be summarised 

 thus: — 



1. A mountain system which dominates the greater part of 

 Asia, and includes stupendous ranges with the loftiest peaks yet 

 discovered in the world. 



2. A series of heights and depressions almost like the steps 



