REVIEWS. 
255 
ment of considerable weight, although not quite conclusive ; especially when 
we consider that in order to do away with certain supposed evidences of 
man in Miocene times, Prof. Boyd Dawkins is obliged to 1 suggest that they 
were made by one of the higher apes then living in France rather than by 
man/ the things to be accounted for being chipped flints and a notched frag- 
ment of a rib of Halitherium. The same argument from the paucity of 
still extant species of mammalia is urged in opposition to the existence of 
man in the Pliocene ; and it is not until post-Pliocene times, when living 
species of mammals were already abundant, that man, 1 as might have been 
expected/ indubitably makes his appearance on the stage. From this time 
there is not only no doubt of the existence of man properly so called, but 
the persevering researches of archaeologists in this country and abroad have 
made us acquainted with a good many particulars as to the characters and 
habits of these early peoples, leading gradually up to that period when 
documentary history of greater or less value becomes available. It is to 
the development of this history of prehistoric man as learned by geological 
and archaeological research, that Prof. Dawkins’ most valuable and interest- 
ing book is devoted. Its title, namely, Early Man in Britain, is perhaps 
hardly sufficient to indicate the variety and importance of its contents, for 
besides that it gives an excellent sketch of the European Tertiaries as eluci- 
dated by the mammalian remains contained in their deposits, even in treating 
of man, its more immediate object, the author’s attention has by no means 
been confined to the narrow limits of these islands, but in investigating the 
sources of the human population of Britain, he has, almost perforce, entered 
upon the consideration of the origin and ethnological relationships of the 
peoples inhabiting the whole of Europe. The author’s line will be best ex- 
plained by the following extract from his concluding summary : — 
‘ The River-drift man/ he says, ‘ first comes before us, endowed with 
all human attributes, and without any signs of a closer alliance to the lower 
animals than is presented by the savages of to-day ; as a hunter, armed with 
rude stone implements, living, not merely in Britain, but throughout western 
and southern Europe, northern Africa, Asia Minor, and India. Next follows 
the Cave-man, possessed of better implements, and endowed with the faculty 
of representing animal forms with extraordinary fidelity, living in Europe, 
north of the Alps and Pyrenees, as far as Derbyshire, and probably belonging 
to the same race as the Eskimos. The disappearance of the Cave-man from 
Britain coincided with the geographical change from a severe to a temperate 
climate, the extinction of some animals, and the retreat of others to northern 
and to southern regions. In the pre-historic age the earliest of the present 
inhabitants arrived in Britain. The small, dark, non- Aryan peoples, who 
spread over France and Spain, brought with them into Britain the domestic 
animals, and the cultivated plants and seeds, and laid the foundation of our 
present culture. The next invaders were the bronze-using Celtic tribes, com- 
posing the van of the Aryan race. They crossed over from the Continent, 
and introduced a higher civilization than that of the Neolithic age. In the 
course of time the use of iron became known, and in the Prehistoric Iron- 
age the condition of Britain was higher than it had ever been before.’ 
This summary of the principal theme of the volume now before us will 
suffice to show the amount of interest attaching to its contents. The 
