Notices of Books. 
398 
[July, 
connection with the land to get them to and from their 
pastures. 
Many of the settlements were destroyed by fire, to which, from 
the combustible character of their materials, they must have 
been particularly liable. It is to the occurrence of these fires 
that we owe the preservation of many of the articles that have 
been obtained from the bottoms of the lakes. The whole of the 
provisions stored up for winter use have in some cases been 
precipitated into the water by the giving way of the burning 
piles. Rare implements of jade and personal ornaments have 
at these times been lost and covered up amongst the debris. 
Even loaves of bread and fruits have been preserved through 
having been charred before falling into the water. 
The oldest of the lake dwellings appear to date back as far as 
the earliest traces we have of neolithic man in Central Europe. 
In these the implements are of stone, bone, and horn, and the 
pottery is rude and entirely hand-made. At this time the lake 
dwellers subsisted largely upon wild animals and fruits, though 
domestic animals and cultivated plants v/ere not unknown. 
Weaving linen cloth was practised in the oldest settlements, and 
hanks of unspun flax and thread, cord, nets, and cloth of the 
same material have been found. 
Up from the rudest stage of the stone age there is a regular 
progression to be observed. The bronze age comes in gradually; 
at first a bronze celt being found amongst the stone ones ; then 
stone-implements become scarce, and those of bronze common 
and of improved form and ornamentation. Throughout, the 
evidence points to the gradual progression in civilisation of the 
same people, influenced, doubtless, by others in a more advanced 
stage living to the south and east, but without any sign of the 
sudden intrusion of a new race bringing with them new weapons 
and customs. Prof. Desor has also shown that the form of skull 
prevalent in the stone age continued through the bronze and 
iron ages, continually increasing in size, and showing a broader 
and higher forehead. It is the same type of skull that prevails 
in the Swiss valleys at the present day, showing that the direCt 
descendants of the builders of the pile dwellings still live around 
the shores of the lakes. 
Some of the breeds of domestic cattle they kept and of the 
varieties of grain they cultivated have also survived to our time, 
though greatly improved. The “ marsh cow ” of the lake 
dwellings is represented by the common Swiss “ brown cow,” 
and some of our varieties of wheat are, according to Dr. Heer, 
the descendants of those grown by the lake dwellers. None of 
the animals known in' these ancient times have become extincft, 
though the domestic breeds have been improved and the wild 
species have in some cases deteriorated, — probably, in the 
latter case, through the curtailment of their feeding-grounds 
by man. 
