168 Analyses of Books . [March, 
follow is an admission that the antiquity of man is totally un- 
known. B. C. Y. has not a particle of evidence to show defi- 
nitely and positively the non-existence of man, say 20,000 years 
ago. He relies on traditions. We must rule that on such a 
subjedt the traditions of ancient nations are no more receivable 
in evidence than would be the alleged testimony of an individual 
man who should profess to tell us, of his own knowledge, the 
history of his early childhood. There is an a priori objection to 
brachy-chronology, as the late Mr. Gosse called it ; it is one of a 
bundle of notions on the earth, on man, and on his surroundings, 
held in the pre-scientific ages. Most of these notions proving to 
be false, in as far as they have been brought to the test of ob- 
servation and experiment, we may fairly expedt that the same 
will be the case with the rest. 
We are curious to know what the author would say concerning 
the foot-prints recently discovered at the Carson State Prison ? 
Would he accept them as conclusive, and strike his flag ? Or 
would he seek to deny their antiquity, or their human origin ? 
We may believe that the earliest men were not savages when 
we can find a child born fully versed in the sciences and arts, and 
not requiring education. 
The author’s remarks on the formation of the different races 
of mankind by the adtion of climate, including a quotation from 
Buffon, are not very happy. Complexion is not the character- 
istic of races, nor is it dependent upon climate. The native race 
of America shows the same complexion in all latitudes. We are 
told of the black Jews in Cochin ; but these Jews are in features, 
shape of skull, and general structure no step nearer the Negro 
type than are their fairer kinsmen in Northern Europe. Again, 
if the Negro has — as the author substantially admits— undergone 
no marked change in the last 3400 years, what length of time, 
we ask, would be necessary for his differentiation from the white 
race ? 
At the very close of the book the author formally declares war 
against Evolution, so far at least as Man is concerned. He de- 
clares that the transformation of any brute into man could not 
have occurred “ without some of the intermediate nondescript 
forms being discovered.” This is a hazardous assertion. We 
can infer little, if anything, from the silence of the great stone 
book. 
There is a further point to which we must draw attention : the 
author declares himself not hostile to Science ; but Science, ac- 
cording to him, must consist simply in noting and chronicling 
fadts. We must not theorise. But a mere catalogue of fadts, 
not to be explained or co-ordinated, is not Science. Indeed it is 
hard to say where pure observation ceases and where inference 
begins. Alike in Science and in common life, the two are blended 
in a manner which almost defies extrication. 
B. C. Y., unfortunately, is one of those who still rejedt the 
