TRANSACTIONS OF SECTION D. DEPT. ANTnEOPOLOGT. 599 



It -will be seen, from the examination of the above table, that our inquirj 

 into the antiquity of man is limited to the last four of the divisions. The most 

 si^ecialised of all animals cannot be looked for until the higher Mammalia by 

 which he is now surrounded were ali\e. We cannot imagine him in the Eocene 

 age, at a time when animal life was not sufficiently differentiated to present us with 

 any living genera of placental mammals. Nor is there any probability of his 

 having appeared on the earth in the Meiocene, because of the absence of higher 

 placental mammals belonging to living species. It is most unlikely that man 

 should have belonged to a fauna in which no other living species of mammal 

 was present. He belongs to a more advanced stage of evolution than the mid- 

 Meioceue of Thenay, as may be seen by a reference to the preceding table. Up to 

 this time the evolution of the animal kingdom had advanced no farther than the 

 Simiadie in the direction of man, and the apes then haunting the forests of Italy, 

 France, and Germany represent the highest type of those on the earth, 



We may also look at the question from another point of view. If man were 

 upon the earth in the Meiocene age, it is incredible that he should not have become 

 something else in the long lapse of ages, and during the changes in the conditions of 

 life by which all the Meiocene land Mammalia have been so profoundly affected, 

 that they have been either exterminated, or have assumed new forms. It is im- 

 possible "to believe that man should have been an exception to the law of change, 

 to which all the higher Mammalia have been subjected since the Meiocene age. 



Nor in the succeeding PleioceJie age can we expect to hnd man upon the earth, 

 because of the very few living species of placental mammals then alive. The 

 evidence brought forward by Professor Oapellini, in favour of Pleiocene man in 

 ItRly, seems both to me and to Ur. Evans unsatisfactory-, and that advanced by 

 Professor Whitney in support of the existence of Pleiocene man in North America, 

 cannot in my opinion be maintained. It is not until we arrive at the succeeding 

 stage, or the Pleistocene, when living species of Mammalia begin to abound, that 

 we meet with indisputable traces of the presence of man on the earth. 



The Pleistocene Period. 



As a preliminary to our inquiry we must first of all define what is meant by the 

 Pleistocene Period. It is the equivalent of the Quaternary of the French, and the 

 Postpleiocene of the older works of Lyell, and it includes all the phenomena known 

 in latitudes outside the Arctic Circle, where ice no longer is to be found, under the 

 name of glacial and inter-glacial. It is characterised in Europe, as I have pointed 

 out in my work on 'Early Man in Britain,' by the arrival of living species,- which 

 may be conveniently divided into five groups, according to their present habitats. 

 The first consists of those now found in the temperate zones of Europe, Asia, and 

 Nortli America. It includes the following animals : — 



Mole, musk shrew, common shrew, mouse, beaver, hare, pika, pouched marmot, 

 water-vole, red field-vole, short-tailed field-vole, continental field-vole, lynx, 

 wild cat, wolf, fox, marten, ermine, stoat, otter, brown bear, grisly bear, badger, 

 horse, bison, urus, saiga antelope, stag, roe, fallow-deer, wild boar. 



The second consists of animals of arctic habit : — 



Russian vole, Norwegian lemming, arctic lemming, varying hare, musk sheep, 

 reindeer, arctic fox, glutton. 



The third is composed of those which enjoy the cold climate of moimtains : — 



The snowy vole, Alpine marmot, chamois, and ibex. 



These animals invaded Europe from Asia, and as the cold increased the tempe- 

 rate group found their way into Southern Europe and Northern Africa, while the 

 arctic division pushed as far south as the Alps and Pyrenees. 



The fourth group of invading forms is represented by animals now only foimd in 

 warm countries : — • 



Porcupine, lion, panther, African lynx,Caffre cat, spotted hyena, striped hyena, 

 and African elephant. 



This group of animals is found as far to the north as Yorkshire, and as far to the 



