LECTURE X. 271 



America, all worked and made use of similar flint im- 

 plements. 



The condition of tlie stone hatchets found in the valley of the 

 Somme also bears evidence of their great activity. As already 

 observed, many of the implements are encrusted with the same 

 film as the flint in its chalky bed. All those made from 

 dark grey flint show also a coloration (called by the French la 

 patme), more or less penetrating into the interior and corre- 

 sponding to that of the gravel in the same strata. In some 

 spots it is white, in others yellow or dark brown. This colora- 

 tion extending to all the edges and surfaces, and penetrating 

 equally into the interior structure, furnishes ample evidence 

 that the period, during which the tools have lain in the strata, is 

 of equal duration with that of the broken gravel forming 

 part of the same bed. In some spots the surfaces have 

 dendrites like those on the Neanderthal skull ; these, however, 

 furnish no absolute proof of great age. 



Beside the stone hatchets no other traces of human industry 

 were found excepting some small round bodies perforated in 

 the centre, which are fossils found in the chalk, and known 

 by the name Coscinopora globularis. At first it was suggested 

 that the hole was artificial, until it was found that many of 

 them stiU imbedded in the chalk were equally perforated ; 

 the central portion, being of a more spongy texture, had 

 probably been scooped out during decomposition. As rows of 

 them have been found in juxtaposition, it is probable that these 

 bodies had been strung together as beads and worn as orna- 

 ments, which is the more likely, as some of these beads, belong- 

 ing to a later period, have been found which were evidently 

 artificially bored. 



Human bones have long been sought for, but in vain, and 

 Lyell, who possesses a mania for explaining everything, did 

 not neglect this opportunity of writing an explanatory treatise 

 on the absence of human fossils in the valley of the Somme. 

 But at last a human jaw was found at Moulin Quignon, near 

 Abbeville (March 29). 



The jaw was carefully removed by Boucher de Perthes from 

 the lowest bluish ferruginous stratum, resting immediately upon 

 the chalk. One of the molars is still in the jaw, the socket of 



