328 THE TUNDRAS AND STEPPES OF PREHISTORIC EUROPE. 



places and are associated with the remains of other characteristic 

 arctic animals which breed in the same regions. Thus well-preserved 

 skeletons of arctic fox, having their milk teeth, have been found lying 

 side by side with the bones of the lemmings. As the arctic fox breeds 

 in June, it is obvious that those young individuals must have died in 

 summer. 



Our knowledge of the former distribution of the arctic lemmings is 

 no doubt not so full as it will yet be, but already we have ascertained 

 that these creatures ranged as far south as central France and the 

 base of the Alps, in Switzerland, and as far west as Somerset, in Eng- 

 land. Besides the arctic fox, many other northern forms were con- 

 geners of the lemmings in middle and western Europe, such as moun- 

 tain hare, muskox, reindeer, glutton, voles of various kinds, ermine, 

 weasel, wolf, common fox, and the now extinct mammoth and woolly 

 rhinoceros. A number of northern birds have also been recorded from 

 tbe same deposits as those which have yielded relics of the tundra 

 animals. I need mention only ptarmigans, buntings, snow owls, ducks, 

 geese, and swans, all of which are in harmony with the arctic charac- 

 ter of the mammals, since the same forms are in our day constant sum- 

 mer visitants in the circumpolar treeless lands. 



We may note, further, that just as there is this evidence to the former 

 occupation of middle and western Europe by an arctic fauna, so we 

 have abundant traces in the same regions of a well-marked arctic flora. 

 High northern species of mosses, the polar willow, the dwarf birch, and 

 various other northern plants have been met with in superficial deposits 

 over a very wide area, extending from southern Sweden and England 

 across middle Europe to the foot of the Alps. 



We can not doubt, therefore, that true tundra conditions have for- 

 merly prevailed at relatively low latitudes in Europe. The widespread 

 distribution of the arctic animals and plants just mentioned points 

 clearly to that and to no other conclusion. We may therefore reasonably 

 infer that the climate of middle Europe must then have approximated 

 in character to that of northern Siberia, the seasons being doubtless 

 strongly contrasted, and thus compelling annual migrations. With tbe 

 advent of summer the home of the arctic lemmings was invaded by 

 troops of visitants — by mammoth, woolly rhinoceros, wild horse, saiga, 

 and many others, and by numerous birds. An arctic-alpine vegetation 

 clothed the low grounds, which in the warm season doubtless showed 

 wide stretches of bog and marsh and many shallow lakes. Here and 

 there flourished patches and wider tracts of birch and willow scrub, 

 but the land was practically treeless. Man, we know, was an occupant 

 of middle Europe at this time. Perhaps, like the mammoth and tbe 

 woolly rhinoceros, he may have been rather a summer visitor than a 

 constant denizen, departing for more clement regions at the approach 

 of winter. We shall probably not err in supposing that the winter 

 would have much resemblance to that now experienced in northern 



