626 WORKS OF ART BY 



XXVI. WOEKS OF AET BY PEIMEVAL MAN IN 



EUEOPE. 1 



Since the exploration of the Brixham Cave in 1858, an im- 

 mense impulse has been given all over Europe to the search 

 for, and study of, the material proofs of the antiquity of the 

 human race. The public mind is now craving for informa- 

 tion on a subject which a few years back was condemned by 

 the general verdict of men of science, and hardly mentioned 

 except in a whisper. Fresh evidence is being brought to 

 light, day after day, of the most interesting and important 

 character, although not tending to carry man back, in every 

 particular instance, to a period of very high geological anti- 

 quity. The south of Europe is the quarter whence the current 

 is now flowing, and the ossiferous caves the springs whence 

 it issues. Professor Busk, in a recent communication (' Eeader,' 

 January 30), has given a very clear and excellent account 

 of discoveries made within the last year in a bone-cave in 

 Gibraltar. The materials, not all yet arrived in England, 

 are now under investigation, and give promise of results of 

 high import. But the most interesting additions have been 

 yielded, very lately, by caves in central France, where what 

 may be called works of art, of primitive execution, have 

 turned up in considerable abundance, which prove that 

 savage man, of the unground and unpolished Stone period, 

 was able, in advance of the use of metals, to sculpture on 

 deer's horns, and to grave on stone, figures of quadrupeds his 

 contemporaries that are now extinct in that region. My 

 friend M. Lartet, on behalf of himself and Mr. Henry Christy, 

 his collaborateur in the work, communicated to the Academy 

 of Sciences on the 29th ultimo an account of these relics, 

 which, when exhibited, produced an unusual sensation among 

 the learned Academicians. I purpose now giving a brief 

 sketch of this new and certainly very ancient walk of art, 

 drawn mainly from M. Lartet's paper, which will speedily 

 appear in the ' Comptes Eendus ' and from figures of the objects. 

 The proofs of the remote antiquity of man are derived 

 from two sources: — 1, the ancient, or 'quaternary,' river 



1 This communication appeared as a letter in the 'Times,' on March 25. 1864. 

 -[Ed.] 



