Dec. 23, I? So] 



NA TURE 



167 



stone is probably both cheaper and more durable than 

 one of metal. The existence of sockets and other working 

 parts formed of stone in our best clocks and watches can 

 hardly be regarded as an instance of low civiUsation, or 

 of those who use them being in the Stone Age. 



In all these remarks Dr. Mitchell will perhaps agree, 

 and if the object of his lectures were merely to inculcate 

 caution in accepting such objects as those he describes as 

 belonging of necessity to any remote antiquity or to an 

 absolutely rude and barbarous people, most archaeologists 

 would fully endorse his views. But there is throughout 

 these lectures a more or less evident intention that they 

 should apply not to any minor questions of archaeological 

 classification, but to the far greater question of the 

 progress of the human race. Though accepting the 

 ordinary division of antiquities into those of the Stone 

 Age, of the Bronze k^i, and of the Iron Age, he does not 

 regard the use of stone, bronze, or iron as in any way 

 indicative of the culture and capacity of those who used 

 them. No doubt many of those who use iron and steel 

 are mentally barbarians, and certainly the instances the 

 author brings forward of the superstitious beliefs still 

 prevalent in Scotland show how deeply rooted are such 

 relics of early beliefs, and how little material civilisation 

 has done to elevate the mental culture of the mass of the 

 population. The distinction Dr. Mitchell draws between 

 culture and civilisation is one which is well illustrated by 

 the continued existence of such low forms of belief ; and 

 all his readers will agree with him that it is an error to 

 suppose that in this or any other civilised country the 

 mass of the people can be spoken of as^highly cultured. 

 Civilisation he defines to be nothing more than a com- 

 plicated outcome of a war waged with Nature by man in 

 society to prevent her from putting into execution in his 

 case her law of Natural Selection. 



Such a view of mankind being to a certain extent 

 exempt from the operation of that law has already been 

 held by many ; but even if accepted does not appear to 

 contradict the opinion that the human race may have 

 been evolved from some lower form of mammalian life. 

 For on such an assumption it is, as Dr. Mitchell insists 

 impossible that man in isolation could become civilised, 

 while, on the other hand, it is evident that until he had 

 become sufficiently intelligent or cultured to enter into 

 association with his fellow men, he would remain subject 

 to the law of Natural Selection in the same manner as any 

 members of the brute creation. Nor even when the stage 

 of association was reached can we expect that there 

 should have been at once any great development of 

 mental power ; for there is a long interval between the 

 banding together of a certain number of human units, 

 and any one of them being in that position of ease and 

 leisure which is so necessary for mental culture. 



It is perfectly true that so far as osteological evidence 

 is concerned there appears to be no tangible dilTerence 

 between the earliest known remains of man and the 

 human frame of the present day. But it is by no means 

 certain that all the skulls which have been attributed to 

 the Quaternary Period actually belong to so remote an 

 antiquity ; and it is worth while to remember that among 

 the coolies of China and some of the Pelew islanders, 

 while the weight of the brain is singularly great, it is 

 balanced by a marked deficiency in the number and depth 



of the secondary convolutions and by a want of depth in 

 the grey matter. 



Dr. Mitchell's view, though we believe nowhere clearly 

 expressed, appears to be that during the whole period of 

 the existence of the human race there was in some part 

 of the world a state of civilisation in existence, which 

 would imply that those among whom it prevailed were 

 possessed of the same average mental capacity as any 

 people or nation of the present day. " May it not happen," 

 he says, " that dealing with the human race as a whole, 

 there never has been a time in its history when there did 

 not oircur among men states both of high and of low 

 civilisation .'' Is it not also possible that there may have 

 never existed a time in the history of mankind as a whole 

 when there were not among those composing it persons 

 potentially as good — persons exhibiting as high a capacity 

 — as any among those who now go to make up mankind ?" 

 Were the history of our race confined to the last five or 

 six thousand years it might be hard to answer these 

 questions otherwise than in the affirmative ; but who that 

 appreciates the vast antiquity of man as established by 

 recent geological discoveries will admit that such a term 

 forms more than a small fractional portion of the period 

 of man's existence upon the earth, or that there is any 

 parity of reasoning between the circumstances of the 

 beginning of the human period and of the comparatively 

 recent times of Egyptian or Assyrian civilisation ? 



Granted even that the potential mental capacity existed, 

 of what use could it have been to those who were daily on 

 the brink of starvation, who were unacquainted with 

 writing, and with metal, and had not even succeeded in 

 domesticating any of those animals which now seem 

 almost necessary for human existence ? 



This however is not the place to enter into a long dis- 

 cussion as to the origin and progress of civilisation. 

 Those, and they are many, who are interested in this 

 subject will do well to read Dr. Mitchell's book, and even 

 should they not agree with all his conclusions, will feel 

 that his cause has not suffered from the treatment it has 

 received at his hands. 



They will also find in his Appendix much valuable 

 matter extracted from the writings of Mr. Alfred R. 

 Wallace, Mr. Herbert Spencer, and Mr. Bancroft. To 

 the antiquary pure and simple the illustrations of the 

 "neo-archaic " objects still in use in Scotland will be 

 attractive and valuable ; and should some stray politician 

 take up the volume some of the reflections on the dangers 

 to civilisation which may arise from over-legislation, as 

 set forth in the last of the lectures, may profitably be 

 studied. 



AUSTRIAN MYRIOPODS 

 Die Myiiopoden der bsterreichisch-ungarischen Mo- 

 narchic. Von Dr. Robert Latzel. Erste Halfte : 

 Die Chilopoden. 8vo. pp. xv. and 228, plates i-x. 

 (Wien : Alfred Holder, 18S0.) 



THE centipedes, millipeds, and their allies have hither- 

 to not only been neglected by English naturalists, 

 but practically by Continental workers, until the present 

 generation. Our countryman, Newport, indeed (of whom 

 it may be said with justice, that he touched nothing that 

 he did not elucidate and adorn), has secured a permanent 



