218 
THE GEOLOGIST. 
quitting tlieir business to join the French professors and aid them with 
their opinions. The frank cordiality, the good faith and impartiahty tliat 
they liave shown in the discussion, is above all praise. . . . Dr. Falconer, 
the great English paljEontologist, and Messrs. Prestwich and Busk, whom 
all the world know by their fine works, have gained for themselves much 
honour. Our town ought to be proud of the reunion within its walls of 
such men, so justly esteemed in France, as well as in England. On the 
14th, M. de Cailleux, member of the Institute, and director-general of 
museums ; Professor Edward Collomb, the well-known mineralogist ; M. 
Hebert, who had already come to the deliberations of the 12th, and other 
Parisian notabilities whose Jiames we regret we do not know ; and lastly, 
a party of pupils of the learned professor of the Sorbonne have arrived 
and visited our beds, now become so celebrated, and the galleries, not less 
known, of M . Boucher de Perthes. We see that this discovery of antedi- 
luvial man, which in otiier times would have passed unperceived, has be- 
come a truly scientific ceremony. 
" In the sciences, as in everything else, the slightest circumstance may 
serve to resolve a great question. Mr. Busk, tlie celebrated English che- 
mist and naturalist, wlio came to Abbeville with Messrs. Falconer and i 
Prestwich, making, on the 12th of this month (May), some experiments on I 
the argillaceous ' black bed,' which contained the jaw and haches from . 
Moulin-Quignon, let fall on the ivory handle of his penknife a drop of the 
black earth wetted with water. On the morrow it had dried, and presented 
a metallic reflection. Having washed it, he perceived that the handle of 
the knife remained perfectly white. This explained to him the non- 
coloration of the implements, and the v. hiteuess which had been preserved 
in the interior of the jaw. This earth, having no staining or penetrating 
qualities, could not alter their surfaces. Mr. Busk immediately acquainted ^ 
Messrs. Prestwich and Falconer, who concurred with him and adopted his i 
opinion. It was this appearance of newness, which however is not an | 
unusual case, that on his (former) return to England had engendered the I 
(then) conviction of Dr. Falconer. He believed, for a time, in a ruse of i 
the workmen ; but, equally conscientious as learned, and never recoiling 
from the truth, the eminent paleeontologist exhibited a real joy when his 
doubts were dissipated and he was able to proclaim the innocence of the ; 
workmen. Honour should be rendered to Dr. Falconer, who, in this dis- ' 
cussion, in London as in Paris and at Abbeville, has given proof not only 
of a profound knowledge but of a probity and courage which French and • 
English alike admire. 
"Messrs. Prestwich and Busk, Dr. Carpenter, and Mr. John Evans, j 
although the latter could not come to France to this second meeting, have \ 
shown the same dignity of character. We applaud these men, who thus 1 
do honour both to science and to their country. Amongst those who have ! 
thrown most light in this discussion must be mentioned the president of i 
the commission, M. Milne-Edwards, M. de Quatrefagcs, the celebrated • 
professor of anthropology, and M. E. Lartet, who for five-and-twenty 
years has made such great progress in palaontological investigations. * 
These gentlemen have supported, \n ithout ever varying, the authenticity J 
of the human fossil and the antiquity of the haches. H 
" A very simple incident had tended more than anything else to enlighten V 
M. de Quatrefagcs. M. Boucher de Perthes had, on the 28th of March, Jl 
extracted the jaw from its bed before numerous witnesses. The workmen, ffl 
who expected to see some monstrous bone appear, as at Menchecourt, were fl 
confounded at the apparition of so small an object, and ^A hich, enveloped ^ 
in its gangue, did not even appear to them to be a bone at all. M. Bouciier 
