Antiquity of Man. 
[October, 
676 
nately the data are clear, and can be studied by any person 
of ordinary intelligence. The trees in question are the bald 
cypress ( Taxodium ) of the Southern States, one of the 
largest and longest of life of the world’s trees. Specimens 
cut down in the present age are known to be from 5000 to 
7000 years old. Humboldt saw one in Mexico of extremely 
large size, which he estimated — from counting the rings of 
smaller trees of the same species to be 8000 years old. 
Such are the trees found in these old, buried forests of the 
delta of the Mississippi. Some of the old trunks were over 
25 feet in diameter. One contained over 5700 annual rings. 
In many instances these huge trees have grown over the 
stumps or fallen trunks of others equally large. Such in- 
stances occur in all, or nearly all, of the ten forest beds. 
Dr. Dowler, one of the best physicians and scientists of 
New Orleans, saw such instances in many places, and con- 
cluded that each of the ten forest growths contained, on the 
average, two such trees of 5000 years each, living in suc- 
cession. This gives to each forest a period of 10,000 years. 
Ten such periods give 100,000 years, without considering 
the time covered by the intervals between the ending of one 
forest and the beginning of another. The thickness of the 
intervening sand shows that this interval was not, in most 
cases, a short one. 
Such evidence would be received in any court of law as 
sound and satisfactory, where common sense evidence is 
used. We do not see how such proof is to be discarded 
when applied to the antiquity of our race. If the antiquity 
of the mastodon was in discussion no one would doubt it. 
Human bones have been found in the fifth forest bed, and 
stone implements still lower. As Rev. Mr. Templin has 
stated, there is satisfactory evidence that man lived in the 
Champlain epoch. But the terrace epoch, or the greater 
part of it, intervenes between the Champlain and delta 
epochs, thus adding to my 100,000 years. If only as much 
time is given to both those epochs combined as to the delta 
period, 200,000 years is the total result. 
There are other evidences in Europe, generally clear to 
the geologist, which sustain this long time for the antiquity 
of man . — Kansas City Review of Science. 
