M. GEAS' ATTACK ON THE FLIJs-T-IMPLEMENTS. 



291 



measured its dimensions aiDproximatclj : it was six metres in length by- 

 one metre ninety centimetres in height, and two metres in breadth. This 

 gallery supported itself well without props. It may be admitted that in 

 former times the excavations were less in breadth and height, which would 

 render them yet more solid. 



The flints freshly extracted, and not deprived of their quarry-moisture, 

 are much easier to work than those of which the drying has proceeded to 

 some length. It is probable, consequently, that the ancient miners roughly 

 formed in the interior of the galleries the axes destined to be polished. 

 After this first labour a selection was doubtless made ; the least shapely 

 pieces, considered improper for sale, were rejected and left on the spot. 

 When, after a length of time, the galleries, which had served at once as 

 shops for mining and for rough-hewing, had crumbled down, the cliipped 

 flints left on the floor were enveloped on all sides by the soil from whence 

 they had been extracted. Supposing that the subsidence of the galleries 

 was propagated up to the surface, the upper sand of argillaceous diluvium 

 must have sunk a little, parallel to itself, without becoming mixed in any 

 way witli the grey flinty diluvium. If this was the real coarse of events, 

 it is certain that at the end of some time all trace of disturbance must have 

 been completely effaced. This explanation agrees well with the rude form 

 of the flints disinterred — so rude, that it is difficult to understand how 

 they can have been put to use in this state. It is confirmed by another 

 jjeculiar circumstance, which had been held to be unimportant, but which, 

 nevertheless, has much import. M. Albert Gaudry, who has been cited 

 above, remarked that the nine worked flints discovered in his presence lay 

 nearly all palpably at the same level. Was not this level that of the floor 

 of an ancient gallery P" 



This is how M. Gras looks at the question from his own point of 

 view, after, as he presumes, he has demolished his adversaries. After 

 De Perthes, Prestwich, Lyell, Evans, we, of the oblique vision in M. 

 Gras' opinion, have been out-argued and convicted of erroneous in- 

 terpretations of the facts. Well ! so, for the nonce, let us suppose 

 the case. Is M. Gras, then, right in the views he promulgates 

 in this summary ? Assuredly not. If we are wrong, according to 

 him, on one side of the barrier of facts, he is wrong on the other. If 

 our geological interpretations do not agree with the evidence of facts, 

 liis historical speculations certainly do not. 



AVhatever eyes M. Boucher de Perthes has for looking at gravel- 

 beds, — and being the first to pick out the flint-implements would 

 cause us to give him credit for sharp ones, — we can for a certainty 

 speak of the capabilities of Mr. Prestwich's organs. We have been 

 over very many miles of gravel and drift deposits with him, over 

 country every lane and turning in which has been familiar to us from 

 infancy ; and we do know, from experience, that if there be anything 

 to be seen, he will see it. Por more than twenty years of his life he 

 has been incessantly studying over England and France, as a favourite 



