424 Reviews — Falconer's Memoirs. 



by killing and collecting the skeletons of all the Indian quadrupeds 

 and reptiles they could procure, and thus, while comparing and 

 discriminating the different recent and fossil bones, they were com- 

 pelled to see and think for themselves. 



This volume contains the long-desiderated text to the Fauna 

 Antiqua Skalensis, the plates of which were issued many years 

 since, of folio size, without letter-press. In 34 octavo plates are 

 contained all the most important figures of the Sewalik Hill Fauna, 

 reduced in size, and re-drawn by Mr. Dinkel. 



The chief of both Sir Proby T. Cautley's and Dr. Falconer's 

 collections are now lodged in the Geological Gallery of the British 

 Museum, and may be seen in Eooms III., V., and VI. No single 

 series, save the Enaliosaiiria of the Lias, occupy so much space or 

 represent so much value, as a collection, as this Sewalik Hill series. 

 Some idea may be formed of the richness of this collection of animal- 

 remains, and the labour involved in its arrangement and description 

 when it is stated that 108 folio plates, executed by Mr. Ford for the 

 original work, contained figures of 1123 specimens (many of which 

 are represented in three, four, or five different views), and that a 

 vast number still remain for future palseontologists to examine. 



Besides the description of this grand collection in Vol. I. is also 

 given a geological sketch of the Himalayas, and a description of 

 the Sewalik Hills, where the the Fauna Sivalensis was unearthed ; 

 also a report of Falconer's expedition to Cashmeer and Little Tibet, 

 which contain wonderful descriptions of natural scenery, and are 

 full of interest to the physical geologist and traveller.^ 



The second volume has 38 plates of remains of Mastodon, Elephas, 

 Rhinoceros, Cervus, etc., etc., in illustration of numerous papers by 

 Falconer, read before the Geological Society and elsewhere; and 

 others edited from his unpublished notes. 



The most important paper in this volume is the xxivth., entitled 

 '' Primeval Man and his Cotemporaries." This important historical 

 essay was written in 1863, and intended by its author as an intro- 

 duction to a distinct work with the above title, the object of which 

 was to set forth the physical proofs of the remote antiquity of the 

 human race, and the physical conditions of the earth's crust prior to 

 and at the date of man's first appearance. No one could have been 

 found possessing greater ability and knowledge than Falconer for 

 this undertaking, and, as we read over these thirty pages, we find 

 how completely he was master of his task. To Falconer's extreme 

 caution and the frequency with which he revised and re-studied all 

 his views and observations before committing them to the press, 

 must be attributed the fact that this promising work on primeval 

 man was never completed. 



That we owe to him the inauguration of a new era in pre- 

 historic investigation can be clearly shown, for before the explor- 

 ation of the Brixham Cave at Torquay, no systematic examination 

 of ossiferous deposits had ever been carried out. The last task of 

 his great and unwearying life was the exploration and inves- 

 1 See extract at page 439 of this present number. 



