THE HUMAN SPECIES. 303 



ticula'.'ly as among the present inhabitants of France there are 

 still extant the wrecks of tribes (the Cagots), which, from the 

 first Celtic invasion to the present time, have never been 

 acknowledged to form a portion of any, though the vulgar is 

 willing to believe they are a residue of Arian Goths : which 

 opinion, even if it were correct, would not much remove them 

 from a Finnic origin. 



We may associate with these, also, the human ossuaries in 

 the caverns of Guienne, in the vicinity of the river Lot in 

 Quercy, described in a former article ; for they indicate a mode 

 of disposing of the dead generally more careful than the Cel- 

 tic ; and from the more common absence of the skulls, and 

 the regular packing of the extremities in layers, an argument 

 may be drawn to show, that they are second and final deposits 

 of the departed of a race, whose first mode of preserving them 

 was to have the bodies sewed up in skins, hung up for a given 

 period in trees, and then buried, often with a stag's horn by the 

 side ; a practice long in use among the Finnic and Gothic 

 nations, and still followed by kindred tribes in both Americas. 



These deposits, in the south of central France, have still, 

 on the mountain above them, the ruins of rectilinear and 

 curved defensive works, not like those of the Gallic tribes ; 

 and as they are in the vicinity of the Basque territory, it is 

 likely that a kindred race was the owner of the soil before 

 they were subdued or expelled by the progressing Celtae. It is 

 most probable, that although the Finnic people spread over 

 Europe, their movement from the east was in general coast- 

 wise, and from north towards the south ; ascending great rivers 

 from the sea, and in some cases -only forming considerable 

 communities. Hence, jn Europe and the high north, they are, 

 with scarce an exception, fish-eaters, boatmen ; never riders; 

 and only graziers, not cultivators, in the south, when secure 

 from the nature of their location ; but even then still substi- 

 tuting osier and willow branches for many purposes of domes- 

 tic utility ; for such is still the practice among the Basques as 



