M. Gil as' attack on THE FLINT-IMPLEMENTS. 
291 
measured its dimensions approximately : 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 chipped 
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 with the grey flinty diluvium. If this was the real course of events, 
it is certain that at the end of some time all trace of disturbance must have 
been completely efiaced. This explanation agrees well with the rude form 
of the flints disinterred — so rude, that it is difllcult to understand how 
they can have been put to use in this state. It is confirmed by another 
peculiar circumstance, which had been held to be unimportant, but which, 
nevertheless, has much import. M. Albert Garfdry, 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 ?" 
This is how M. Gras looks at the qaestion 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. AVell ! 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, 
his historical speculations certainly do not. 
AV^hatever 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. For more than twenty years of his life he 
has been incessantly studying over England and France, as a favourite 
