Dr J. W. Dawsou on the Antiquity of Man. 45 



penetration of the trade throughout Europe ; but of course 

 wars or migrations might retard or accelerate the process ; 

 and there may have been isolated spots in which a partial 

 stone period extended up to those comparativel}^ modern 

 times, wlien first the Greek trade, and afterwards the entire 

 overthrow of the Carthaginian power by the Eomans, ter- 

 minated for ever the age of bronze, and substituted the age 

 of iron. This would leave, according to our ordinary chro- 

 nologies, at least ten or fifteen centuries for the post- 

 diluvian stone period ; a time quite sufiicient, in our view, 

 for all that part of it represented by such remains as those 

 of the Danish coast, and the still more remarkable platform 

 habitations, whose remains have been found in the Swiss 

 lakes, and which belong properly to the recent period of 

 geology. In connection with this, we would advise the 

 reader to study the many converging lines of evidence 

 derived from history, from monuments, and from language, 

 which Dr Wilson shows, in his concluding chapter, to point 

 to the comparatively recent origin of at least post-diluvian 

 man. Let it be observed, also, that the attempts of Bunsen 

 and others to deduce an extraordinarily long chronology from 

 Egyptian monuments, and from the diversity of languages, 

 have signally failed ; and that the observations made by Mr 

 Horner in the Nile alluvium are admitted to be open to too 

 many doubts to be relied on.* 



Before leaving the recent period, it is deserving of note 

 that Sir C. Lyell shows on the best evidence, that in Scot- 

 land, since the building of the wall of Antoninus, an elevation 

 of from twenty-five to twenty-seven feet has occurred both 

 on the eastern and western coast, and consequently that the 

 raised sea-bottoms containing canoes, &c., in the valley of 

 the Clyde, supposed by some to be of extremely ancient date, 

 were actually under water in the time of the Eomans ; a 

 fact of which, but for their occupation of the country, we 

 should have been ignorant. 



From the recent period we pass, under the guidance of 



* The chronology deduced from the Delta of the Tiniere, which would give 

 to the stone period an antiquity of 5000 to 7000 years, appears to us to be 

 similarly defective ; and the data assigned to human remains in the valleys 

 of the Mississippi and Ohio, and the old reefs of Florida, still more so. 



