160 
THE DESCENT OF MAN. 
Pakt I- 
are likewise of some importance for its success, and 
these depend in part on the nature and amount of the 
food which can be obtained. In Europe the men of the 
Bronze period were supplanted by a more powerful and, 
judging from their sword- handles, larger-handed race ; 3 
but their success was probably due in a much higher 
degree to their superiority in the arts. 
All that we know about savages, or may infer from 
their traditions and from old monuments, the history 
of which is quite forgotten by the present inhabitants, 
shew that from the remotest times successful tribes have 
supplanted other tribes. Eelies of extinct or forgotten 
tribes have been discovered throughout the civilised 
regions of the earth, on the wild plains of America, and 
on the isolated islands in the Pacific Ocean. At the 
present day civilised nations are everywhere supplanting 
barbarous nations, excepting where the climate opposes 
a deadly barrier ; and they succeed mainly, though not 
exclusively, through their arts, which are the products 
of the intellect. It is, therefore, highly probable that 
with mankind the intellectual faculties have been 
gradually perfected through natural selection ; and this 
conclusion is sufficient for our purpose. Undoubtedly 
it would have been very interesting to have traced the 
development of each separate faculty from the state in 
which it exists in the lower animals to that in which d 
exists in man ; but neither my ability nor knowledge 
permit the attempt. 
It deserves notice that as soon as the progenitors of 
man became social (and this probably occurred at il 
very early period), the advancement of the intellectual 
faculties will have been aided and modified in an 
important manner, of which we see only traces 
1 Morlot, 1 Soc. Vaud. Sc. Nat.’ I860, p. 294. 
