276 FOOTPRINTS OF VANISHED RACES IN CORNWALL. 



the bones of our g'reat ancestors "! Torrens tells us,*' that in the 

 Himalayas the bones of fossil elephants are considered to be those 

 of giants, and Mr. Darwin found similar stories current in South 

 America."^ But we may come much nearer home. We all know 

 the story of the prehistoric wrestling match on Plymouth Hoe, in 

 which Corineeus overthrew the giant Grogmagog,*^ and we are 

 also aware that in the fissures and in the alluvial deposits on the 

 Hoe the bones of elephants and rhinoceroses have frequently 

 been discovered.^" The stories about dragons have a similar origin. 

 At Klagenfurth, in Carinthia, the head of a dragon was preserved, 

 which Professor linger found to be that of a rhinoceros. ^^ The 

 Manchoo dragon in China also originated from the numerous 

 bones of the mammoth, which were found in Mongolia and 

 Manchuria. Dragon stories occur in the West of England, and 

 are not unknown in Cornwall, while traditions relate the conflicts 

 which occurred between the tinners and the dragons in the 

 valleys of Dartmoor.^^ All this leads me to conclude that in 

 prehistoric days many of the bones of the elej)hant, rhinoceros 

 and hippopotamus were found in Cornwall, by the rude primitive 

 inhabitants, and were by them considered to have belonged to a 

 race of gigantic human beings. 



How long Palaeolithic man lived in Western Britain is un- 

 certain, but his end was tragic. He was ovei'whelmed by one of 

 those great catastrophes, which occur even now, as we have lately 

 seen in the Krakatoa eruption, and more recently in the disasters 

 in St. Vincent and Martinique. In bygone ages these convulsions 

 were more frequent, and were of a more tremendous character. 

 At the end of the Pahieolithic age the land sank, and tumultuous 

 waters swept over western Europe, by which PalfBolithic man was 

 fairly drowned out, and the great mammalia associated with him 

 were destroyed. The proofs of this cataclysm, so far as the West 



47. Travels in Kashmir and Ladakh, pp. 85, 86. 



48. Voyage of the Beagle, chap. viii. 



49. This tradition is admirably analysed by Mr. R. N. Worth iu Transactions 

 of the Devon Association, 1880. 



50. See also R. N. Worth's paper on the deposit of Plymouth Hoe, in the 

 Transactiotts of the Devon Association for 1875. 



51. Figuier's IVorld before the Debige, pp. 316, 317. 



52. Prehistoric Devon. An Addi'ess to the Plymouth Institution,\?ii\, by R. N. 

 Worth, p. 38. 



