REVIEWS. 
371 
them. This tree is not now, nor has ever been in historical times, a native 
of the Danish islands, and when introduced there, has not thriven ; yet it 
was evidently indigenous in the human period, for Steenstrup lias taken 
out with his own hands a flint instrument from below a buried trunk of 
one of these pines. It appears clear that the same Scotch fir was after- 
wards supplanted by the sessile variety of the common oak, of which 
many prostrate trunks occur in the peat, at higher levels than the pines ; 
and still higher, the pedunculated variety of the same oak ( Quercus Robur) 
occurs, with the alder, birch, and hazel. The oak has now, in its turn, 
been almost superseded in Denmark by the common beech.” The trace 
of the first race of men — that of the stone age — having been found beneath 
the peat deposit containing the pines, which have never been known to 
live in Denmark, and which must have taken of themselves centuries to 
acquire the bulk described above, affords us some idea of the enormous 
lapse of time which must have intervened between the period of the for- 
mation of that single flint weapon and the present day. The testimony 
supplied by the shell mounds of various countries, and the ancient Swiss 
dwellings, is given at length ; and on the subject of upraised strata in 
Sweden and Norway, the information is most copious. In calculating the 
time required in elevating those deposits of Norway, some of which, con- 
taining recent shells, reach a height of 600 feet, Sir Charles writes, — “ A 
mean rate of continuous vertical elevation of two and a half feet in a 
century would, I conceive, be a high average ; yet, even if this be assumed, 
it would require 24,000 years for parts of the seacoast of Norway, where 
the post-tertiary marine strata occur, to attain the height of 600 feet.” 
The Neanderthal and Engis skulls have their respective merits well dis- 
cussed, and on this matter we are treated to an admirable extract from 
Professor Huxley’s recent work. In regard to the fossil man of Natchez, 
the author does not concur in the opinion of some geologists that the 
human race and the mastodon were contemporaries. The chapters on the 
glacial period are most important, and embrace a series of maps illustrating 
the successive revolutions in physical geography during the post-pliocene 
period. In these we are shown what portions of the British isles would 
remain above water if the whole area subsided to a depth of 600 feet ; and 
also what portion of our present sea would become land if there was a 
general rise of the area of north-west Europe to the extent of 600 feet. 
Not the least interesting portion of the volume before us is that which 
relates to the various theories framed from time to time to explain the 
origin of species. The author, who, be it known, is an advocate of 
Mr. Darwin’s doctrine, gives a brief sketch of the hypothesis first framed 
by Lamarck. The latter, who may be said to have been the first who openly 
denied the truth of the theory of the creation of species, came to the con- 
clusion that none of the plants and animals which now exist upon the 
globe were primordially created, but had descended from pre-existing- 
types. This variation he believed to be due to various external causes, 
such as soil, climate, temperature, &c., and he explained the continuance 
of the original forms from which the new ones were derived, on the suppo- 
sition that the germs of living things were constantly making their appear- 
ance upon the globe. He accounted for modifications of form by saying. 
