146 
THE GEOLOGIST. 
betvreon the different tribes m liich at that period inhabited France. These 
premises he merely puts forward, reserving for a future occasion the dis- 
cussion which alone can establish their correctness. What he desires to 
do now is to show that the field of discovery as to the antiquity of the 
human race is at least open, and that this question, already so wide from 
the little we as yet know, seems likely to be spread still wider by such dis- 
coveries as that of which he gives the details. 
An object " incontestably fashioned by the hand of man" has been found 
at a depth of 75 metres from the soil, in a perfectly virgin bed of the hg- 
nites or " cendres noires " at Laon, the geological age of which goes back, 
as is know-n, to the earliest times of the Paris basin deposits. Not but 
that objects of modern production have been found in these rery beds, 
and he cites particularly a flint "hache," which was found fourteen years 
since at 25 feet under ground, in the middle even of the lignites quarried 
near the village of Lille, canton of Fere, department of Aisne. But these 
facts, besides being so rare, are capable, in general, of being explained by 
accidental causes of entombment, the lignites of the Laonnois and of the 
Soissonois lying ordinarily at the surfiice or only being covered by foreign 
deposits of no great thickness. This is not the case with the ash-bed of 
Montaigu, near Laon, whence the object in question comes. " The ex- 
ceptional conditions of the bedding where it was found is precisely that 
which gives to this discovery a special interest, and perhaps a considerable 
value ; and it is thus necessar}- to give here a slightly detailed description, 
and to make known the method of quarrying." 
"The lignites worked for agricultural purposes near the village of 
Montaigu, four leagues north-east of Laon, occupy the foot of a Tertiary 
hill, constituted at its base of clays, amongst which these lignites are 
intercalated ; in the middle, of thick masses of sand, enclosing some beds 
of shells ; and at the summit by newer clays superposed on thick beds of 
hard rock — the Calcaire grossier of geologists, which form the crown of 
the hill. The ' ash-bed' is quarried by means of subterranean galleries, 
which extend in different directions under the hill — the principal one be- 
ing driven into the centre of it for a considerable distance, its extremity 
not being less than 600 metres from the point where it opens on the 
valley. This bed is about 2'30 metres thick, and is covered by another bed 
of marly and sandy clay, full of fossil shells peculiar to that age — Cyrena 
cuDeiformis, Osfrea hellovacina, etc., and which serves for the roof or 
ceiling of the quarry. This roof is sustained by means of wooden shores 
placed under and across as the gallery extends ; the head onl\' of the gal- 
lery being left free for the work of extraction. The 'ash-bed,' attacked 
at the foot, ftUls down into the space called the 'chamber,' detaching itself 
cleanly from the roof alluded to ; and then the ' ashes ' are put into small 
waggons running on an iron tramway. These ' waggons' in their turn are 
pushed by men out of the quarry, and the ' ash ' is discharged and made 
into a heap for burning before being sold for agriculture. In the month 
of August last year (1861) the workmen employed at the end of the prin- 
cipal gallery, in throwing down a block of * ashes,' observed with sur- 
prise an object detach itself and roll to some distance. Struck with this 
incident, such as had never before happened to them, they hastened to 
search for it, and found a ball of moderate dimensions. But their astonish- 
ment was increased when on examuiing it they thought they recognized it 
as the work of man's hand. They looked then to see exactl}- w hat place in 
strata it had occupied, and they are able to state that it did not come from 
the interior of the 'ash,' but that it was imbedded at its point of contact 
with the roof of the quarry, where it had left its impression indented. 
