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good and clear account. Let us take tlie Neanderthal skull and La Naulette 
jaw as examples : — 
u The most important of these remains is the celebrated Neanderthal skull 
already mentioned * * * which Huxley describes as the most ape-like of 
all the human skulls that he has ever seen, and of which he says that in its 
examination we meet with ape-like characters in all parts, and also that it 
has the greatest similarity with the existing Australian skulls, and with the 
ancient Borreby skulls. Huxley also states that this skull is by no means 
an isolated phenomenon, but that it is only the extreme term of a long 
series of bestial, or, at least, very lowly-developed human skulls of the past 
and present periods.” Again, on the same subject, the author writes : “in 
the year 1866 a fragment of a human jaw with very remarkable and animal 
characters was found by the indefatigable Belgian cave-explorer, Hr. Edward 
Dupont, in the Trou de la Naulette , a lone cave situated on the bank of the 
little river Lesse, not far from the village of Chaleux. It was in a deposit 
of river-loam, covered with a layer of stalagmite, and at a depth of about 
four metres. The most remarkable of its characters, besides the compara- 
tive thickness and rounded form of the bone, and its elliptical dental curve, 
is the almost entire absence of the chin. The projecting or prominent chin is 
so distinctive a character of man that Linne, the great lawgiver of 
systematic zoology, could name no better bodily distinctions between man 
and animals, than the upright position and prominent chin of the former. 
In animals, instead of proj ecting the chin retreats, and the jaw of La Naulette 
holds an intermediate position between the two ; where the projection of the 
chin ought to be, it exhibits a line descending perpendicularly. Moreover the 
cavities destined for the reception of the canine teeth are remarkably wide 
and large as in animals, although the canines themselves are closely con- 
tiguous to the incisors, and not molars, and the jaw is thus shewn to be 
undoubtedly of human origin. But what is still more remarkable than this 
is the circumstance that the three hinder or persistent molars present exactly 
the same relative sizes as is usual in the anthro-promorphous apes. Thus 
whilst in the higher races of man, the three true molars are so arranged that 
the first is the largest and the last or hindermost the smallest, we find in 
the dentition of the lower races, such as the Malays and Negroes, that all 
the three molars are of equal size, and throughout larger than usual. But 
in the anthropoid apes the first true molar is the smallest, and the last the 
largest, and this is the case also in this fossil human jaw, the last or hinder- 
most molar of which even appears to have possessed five roots. To all this 
may be added that the inner surface of the jaw at the point of the so-called 
suture or symphisis, behind the incisor teeth, forms a line obliquely directed 
upwards, and consequently leaves no doubt as to the prognathism of its 
former possessor.” 
We fancy that the above quotation will suffice to show that the author 
has not dealt in a slovenly fashion with his book, but ha3 been at care in 
dealing with points of evidence ; he gives them fully, minutely, and 
thoroughly. The other portions of the book are alike, and they all bear 
the author along to the conclusion regarding man, which he expresses in his 
last chapter. We must now leave the work in our readers’ hands, begging 
of them to read it carefully, and not either from enthusiasm or from malice 
to do this author’s efforts any injustice. 
