190 
TUE GEOLOGIST. 
shaped them into form. Why it should be so has remained a mystery, for 
human bones are as enduring as those of deer, horse, sheep, or oxen, and 
fossil bones of extinct animals are not unfrequent in the Somme Yalley 
deposits. At last it was thought that the objects so long sought for in vain 
had been discovered. To pass over minor incidents, on the 28th of March 
M. de Perthes was summoned to the gravel-pit of Moulin-Quignon (de- 
scribed by Mr. Prestwich in his memoir in the Philosophical Transactions) 
to examine, in situ, what appeared to be a portion of bone projecting from 
the cliff of the section, close to its base. (' L'Abbevillois,' Avril 9.) The 
specimen was carefully detached with his own hands by M. de Perthes, 
and proved to be the entire half of an adult human lower jaw, quite per- 
fect, and containing one back tooth, — namely, the penultimate, or last but 
one. The sockets of the other teeth were all present, and filled with ma- 
trix, with the exception of the antepenultimate, the socket of which was 
effaced, the tooth having been lost during life. The solitary molar present 
was hollow from caries, and crammed with matrix. 
'•The deposit from which the jaw was extracted is the 'black seam 
flinty gravel,' so called from its intensely dark (bluish-black) colour, 
arising from oxides of iron and manganese. It rests immediately upon 
the chalk, and belongs to what Prestwich calls the ' high level ' series, 
being the oldest of the Somme Valley beds. A thin cake of black man- 
gano- ferruginous clayey matter is interposed between the chalk and the 
gravel. If the jaw proved to be authentic, and came out of the alleged 
position, it indicated man, by an actual bone, at a period of extremely re- 
mote antiquity. The appearance of the jaw was entirely in keeping with 
the matrix, i. e. dark-coloured and fairly covered with a layer of it. A 
single detached human molar w as found at the same time, corresponding 
exactly in appearance and matrix ; and, to complete the case, a flint hatchet, 
covered with black matrix, was extracted from the same spot by M. Oswald 
Duupre, wlio accompanied M. de Perthes. These details are all given in 
the ' Abbevillois ' of the 9th instant. 
"Two practised experts, Mr. John Evans and Mr. Prestwich, preceded 
me, on the 11th inst., to Abbeville, and their suspicions were instantly 
aroused. They pronounced the flint hatchets to be modern fabrications. 
I followed on the 14th, and got three of them out of the ' black seam 
gravel,' covered with matrix, and having every external appearance of 
reliability ; but, on severely testing them on my return to London, they 
all proved to be spurious. M. Quatrefages, member of the Institute, and 
the eminent Professor of Anthropology in the Jardin des Plantes, got two 
of them in my presence from the same spot on the 15th inst. What they 
have proved to be I know not as yet, but I anticipate the same results. 
The number aa hich turned out was marvellous, but the terrassiers were 
handsomely paid for their findings, and the crop of flint-hatchets became 
in like degree luxuriant. 
" jS^ow for the jaw itself. Wliat complexion of intrinsic evidence did it 
yield ? The craniological materials available at Abbeville for comparison 
were, of course, very limited ; but the specimen presented a series of pecu- 
liarities which are rarely seen conjunction in the jaws of European races, 
ancient or recent. Here I must be a little technical. 1. The posterior 
margin of the ascending ramus was extremely reclinatc, so as to form a 
very obtuse angle with the ascending ramus. 2. The ascending ramus was 
unusually low and broad. 3. The sigmoid notch, instead of yielding an 
outline somewhat like a semicircle, was broad, shallow, and crescentiform. 
4.^ The condyle Avas unusually globular. 5. What was most remarkable 
of all, the posterior angle presented what I may venture to call a marsu- 
