358 



THE GEOLOGIST. 



which, if the foregoing facts are truly interpreted, would seem nevertheless to 

 have been marked, before its end, by the presence of Man on a land clothed 

 with a vegetation apparently very similar to that now nourishing in like 

 latitudes, and whose waters were inhabited by Testacea also of forms now 

 living ; while on the surface of the land there lived Mammalia, of which some 

 species are yet the associates of man, although accompanied by others, many of 

 them of gigantic size, and of forms now extinct." 



Mr. Prestwich's paper contains much more valuable matter, and much more 

 minute detail, than we can afford space to give. It is more fully illustrated 

 with excellent plates, maps, sections, and woodcuts, of more finish and detail 

 than the merely characteristic sketches we have made from them. We have 

 given enough, however, to bring before our readers the important features of 

 his valuable paper. We now pass to that of Mr. Evans, printed in the 

 Archaeologia. 



" It has been generally supposed that the last of the great geological changes 

 took place at a period long antecedent to the appearance of man upon the earth, 

 and that the modifications of the earth's surface of which he has been a wit- 

 ness have been — with the exception of those due directly to volcanic agency — 

 but trifling and immaterial. 



"The subject of the present paper, the discovery of flint implements wrought 

 by the hand of man, in what are certainly undisturbed beds of gravel, sand, 

 and clay, both on the continent and in this country, tends to show that such 

 an opinion is erroneous ; and that in this region of the globe, at least, its sur- 

 face has undergone far greater vicissitudes since man's creation than has 

 hitherto been imagined. A discovery of this kind must of necessity be of 

 great interest both to the geologist, as affording an approximate date for the 

 formation of these superficial beds of drift, and as exemplifying the changes 

 which the fauna of this region has undergone since man appeared among its 

 occupants ; and also to the antiquary, as furnishing the earliest relics of the 

 human race with which he can hope to become acquainted — relics of tribes of 

 apparently so remote a period, that — 



Antiquity appears to have begun 

 Long after their primeval race was run. 



But beyond the limited circle of those peculiarly interested in geology or archae- 

 ology, this discovery will claim the especial attention of all who, whether on 

 ethnological, philological, or theological grounds, are interested in the great 

 question of the antiquity of man upon the earth. 



"The question whether man had or had not coexisted wit li the extinct pachy- 

 dermatous and other mammals, whose bones are so frequently found in the more 

 recent geological deposits, had indeed already more than once been brought 

 under the notice of scientific inquirers by the discovery of flint flakes and 

 implements ami fragments of rude pottery, in conjunction with the remains of 

 these animals in several ossiferous caverns both in England and on the conti- 

 nent . Among the former may be mentioned Kent's Cavern near Torquay, and 

 among the latter those of Bize, of Pondres, and Souvignargues, and those on 

 the banks of the Meuse, near Liege, explored by Dr. Schmerling, where human 

 bones were also found, apparently washed in at the same time as the bones of 

 the extinct quadrupeds. In some ossiferous caves in the Brazils similar dis- 

 co\ cries had also been made by Dr. Lund and M. Claussen, and, from the con- 

 dition and situation of the human remains, Dr. Lund concluded that they had 

 belonged to an ancient tribe that was coeval with some of the extinct 

 mammalia. 



"But it was always felt that there was a degree of uncertainty attaching to 



