118 ON THE HISTORY OF THE SPEEAD OF THE EUROPEAN FAUNA. 



must have settled and bred in France on the way ; and, if none of 

 their descendants are found in France, they could not have 

 come overland, but must have been imported by ship ; as the 

 snake and the slug and the insects referred to might readily have 

 been in the innumerable cargoes of frnit and vegetables, that have 

 in the course of ages sailed from Spain to Britain, and the moles 

 may possibly have been also. 



Secondly, there is a confusion in the paper between the migration 

 of fauna in the historic age, or say during the last 4,000 3'ears, and 

 its extension in an earlier age which must have possessed different 

 characteristics, since rhinoceroses, hippopotami and hyenas then 

 abounded in countries where they now cannot live ; and since the 

 relics of man associated with their remains show that the human 

 race then possessed much greater strength than in historic times, 

 and, as evidenced in the Old Man of Cromagnon, probably much 

 greater longevity. I speak of course of the Palaeolithic Age, which 

 the late Sir William Dawson identified with the Antediluvian. In 

 the later age it was needful that the land animals should all spread 

 from Western Asia ; and it is most interesting to hear from the 

 lecturer an account of this spreading. But in the earlier age there 

 was no such necessity; and we should naturally suppose that at 

 their very creation they were dotted at various points over the 

 earth's surface wherever there was the greatest sustenance for 

 them. • 



The thanks of the meeting having hoen accorded to the author 

 for liis interesting and able paper the meeting separated. 



