no longer doubted—men not only existed, but in numbers and widely spread—pal?olithic implements of similar type found everywhere—progress shown—tests of antiquity—position of strata—fauna—oldest types—mixed northern and southern species—reindeer period—correspondence of human remains with these three periods—advance of civilization—clothing and barbed arrows—drawing and sculpture—passage into neolithic and recent periods—corresponding progress of physical man—distinct races—how tested—tests applied to historical, neolithic, and pal?olithic man—long heads and broad heads—aryan controversy—primitive european types—canon taylor—huxley—preservation of human remains depends mainly on burials—about forty skulls and skeletons known from quaternary times—summary of results—quatrefages and hamy—races of canstadt—cro-magnon—furfooz—truchere—skeletons of neanderthal and spy—canstadt type oldest—cro-magnon type next—skeleton of cro-magnon—broad-headed and short race resembling lapps—american type—no evidence from asia, africa, india, polynesia, and australia—negroes, negrillos, and negritos—summary of results.
the time is past when it is necessary to go into any lengthened argument to prove that man has existed throughout the quaternary period. less than half a century has elapsed since the confirmation of boucher-de-perthes' discovery of pal?olithic implements in the old gravels of the somme, and yet the proofs have multiplied to such an extent that they are now reckoned, not by scores or hundreds, but by tens of thousands. they have been found not in one locality or in one formation 318 only, but in all the deposits of the quaternary age, from the earliest to the latest, and in association with all the phases of the quaternary period, from the extinct mammoth, woolly rhinoceros, and cave-bear, to the reindeer, horse, ox, and other existing animals. no geologist or pal?ontologist, who approaches the subject with anything like competent knowledge, and without theological or other prepossessions, doubts that man is as much a characteristic member of the quaternary fauna as any of these extinct or existing animals, and that reasonable doubt only begins when we pass from the quaternary into the tertiary ages. i will content myself, therefore, instead of going over old ground and 319 proving facts which are no longer disputed, with showing what bearing they have on the question of human origins.
pal?olithic celt (type of st. acheul).
from quaternary deposits of the nerbudda, india.
pal?olithic celt in argillite.
from the delaware, united states (abbott).
the first remarkable fact to note is, that at this remote period man not only existed, but existed in considerable numbers, and already widely spread over nearly the whole surface of the habitable earth.
implements and weapons of the pal?olithic type, such as celts or hatchets, lance and arrow-heads, knives, borers and scrapers of flint, or if that be wanting of 320 some hard stone of the district, fashioned entirely by chipping without any grinding or polishing, have been found in the sands and gravels of most of the rivers of southern england, france, belgium and germany, of the tagus and manzanares in spain, and the tiber in italy. still more numerously also in the caves and glacial drifts of these and other european countries. nor are they confined to europe. stone implements of the same type have been found in algeria, morocco, and 321 egypt, and in natal and south africa. also in greece, syria, palestine, hindostan, and as far east as china and japan, while in the new world they have been found in maryland, ohio, california, and other states in north america, and in brazil, and the argentine pampas in the south. and this has been the result of the explorations of little more than thirty years, prior to which the coexistence of man with the extinct animals was almost universally denied; and of explorations which except in a few european countries have been very partial.
pal?olithic flint celt (type of st. acheul).
from algeria (lubbock).
pal?olithic celt of quartzite from natal, south africa.
(quatrefages.)
322 in fact the area over which these evidences of man's existence have been found may be best defined by the negative, where they have not been found, as there is every probability that it will eventually be proved that, with a few exceptions, wherever man could have existed during the quaternary period, there he did exist. the northern portions of europe which were buried under ice-caps are the only countries where considerable search has failed to discover pal?olithic implements, while nearly all asia, africa, and america, and vast extents of desert and forests remain unexplored.
the next point to observe is, that throughout the whole of the quaternary period there has been a constant progression of human intelligence upwards. any theory of human origins which says that man has fallen and not risen is demonstrably false. how do we know this? the time scale of the quaternary as of other geological periods is determined partly by the superposition of strata, and partly by the changes of fauna. in the case of existing rivers which have excavated their present valleys in the course of ages, it is evident that the highest deposits are the oldest. if the somme, seine, or thames left remains of their terraces and patches of their silts and gravels at heights 100 feet or more above their present level, it is because they began to run at these higher levels, and gradually worked their way downwards, leaving traces of their floods ever lower and lower. in the case of deposits in caves or in still water, or where glacial moraines and débris are superimposed on one another, the case is reversed, and the lowest are the oldest and the highest the most recent.
in like manner if the fauna has changed, the remains found in the highest deposits of rivers and lowest, of 323 caves will be the oldest, and will become more modern as we descend in the one case or ascend in the others.
this is practically confirmed by the coincidence of innumerable observations. the oldest quaternary fauna is characterized by a preponderance of three species, the mammoth (elephas primigenius), the woolly rhinoceros (rhinoceros tichorinus), and the cave-bear (ursus spel?us).
there are a few survivals from the pliocene, as the gigantic elephant (elephas antiquus) and a few anticipations of later phases, as the reindeer, horse, and ox, but the three mentioned are, with pal?olithic man, the most characteristic. then comes a long period when a strange mixture of northern and southern forms occurs. side by side with the remains of arctic animals such as the mammoth, the glutton, the musk ox, and the lemming, are found those of african species adapted only for a warm climate, the lion, panther, hyena, and above all the hippopotamus, not distinguishable from the existing species, which could certainly not have lived in rivers that were frozen in winter.
the intermixture is most difficult to account for. no doubt africa and europe were then united, and the theory of migration is invoked. the arctic animals may, it is said, have moved south in winter and the african animals north in summer, and this was doubtless the case to some extent. but there are some facts which militate against this theory; for instance, the hyena caves, which seem to show a continuous occupation by the same african species for long periods. nor is it easy to conceive how the hippopotamus could have travelled every summer from africa to yorkshire, and retreated every autumn with the approach of frost. 324 such instances point rather to long inter-glacial periods with vicissitudes of climate, enabling now a northern, and now a southern fauna to inhabit permanently the same region.
be this as it may, the fact is certain that this strange intermixture of northern and southern species is found in almost all the european deposits of the quaternary age, until towards its close with the coming on of the second great glacial period, when the southern forms disappear, and the reindeer, with an arctic or boreal flora and fauna, become preponderant, and extend themselves over southern france and germany up to the alps and pyrenees.
the quaternary period is therefore roughly divided by geologists into three stages: 1st, that of the mammoth and cave-bear, there being some difference of opinion as to which came first, though probably they were simultaneous; 2nd, the middle stage of the mixed fauna; 3rd, the latest stage, that of the reindeer.
now to these stages there is an exact correspondence in the character of the human implements found in them. in the earliest, those of the oldest deposits and of the oldest animals, we find the rudest implements. they consist almost exclusively of native stones, chipped roughly into a few primitive shapes: celts, which are merely lumps of flint or other hard stone with a little chipping to supplement natural fractures in bringing them to a point or edge, while the butt-end is left rough to be grasped by the hand; scrapers with a little chipping to an edge on one side; very rude arrow-heads without the vestige of a barb or socket; and flakes struck off at a blow, which may have served for knives. as we ascend to later deposits we find these primitive types 325 constantly improving. the celts are chipped all over and the butt-ends adapted for haftings, so also are the other implements and weapons, and the arrow-heads by degrees acquire barbs. but the great advance occurs with the use of bone, which seems to have been as important a civilizing agent for pal?olithic as metals were for neolithic man. this again seems to have been due to the increasing preponderance of the reindeer, whose horns afforded an abundant and easily manipulated material for working into the desired forms by flint knives.
at any rate the fact is, that as we trace pal?olithic man upwards into the later half of the quaternary period when the reindeer became abundant, we find a notable advance of civilization. needles appear, showing that skins of animals were stitched together with sinews to provide clothing. barbed arrows and harpoons show that the arts of war and of the chase had made a great advance on the primitive unhafted celt. and finally we arrive at a time when certain tribes showed not only an advance in the industrial arts, but a really marvellous proficiency in the arts of sculpture and drawing. in the later reindeer period, when herds of that animal and of the wild horse and ox roamed over the plains of southern france and germany, and when the mammoth and cave-bear, though not extinct, were becoming scarce, tribes of pal?olithic savages who lived in the caves and rock shelters of the valleys of southern france and germany, and of switzerland and belgium, drew pictures of their chases and of the animals with which they were surrounded, with the point of a flint on pieces of bone or of schist. they also carved bones into images of these animals, to adorn the handles of their 326 weapons or as idols or amulets. both drawings and sculptures are in many cases admirably executed, so as to leave no doubt of the animal intended, especially in the case of the wild animals, for the rare portraits of the human figure are very inferior. most of them represent the reindeer in various attitudes, but the mammoth, the cave-bear, the wild horse, the bos primigenius, and others, are also represented with wonderful fidelity.
with the close of the reindeer age we pass into the recent period and from pal?olithic to neolithic man. physically there is no very decided break, and we cannot draw a hard-and-fast line where one ends and the other begins. all we can say is, that there is general evidence of constantly decreasing cold during the whole post-glacial period, from the climax of the second great glaciation until modern conditions of climate are fairly established, and the existing fauna has completely superseded that of the quaternary, the older characteristic forms of which having either become extinct or migrated. how does this affect the most characteristic of all quaternary forms, that of man? can we trace an uninterrupted succession from the earliest quaternary to the latest modern times, or is there a break between the quaternary and recent periods which with our present knowledge cannot be bridged over? and did the division of mankind into distinct and widely different races, which is such a prominent feature at the present day and ever since the commencement of history, exist in the case of the pal?olithic man, whose remains are so widespread?
these are questions which can only be answered by the evidence of actual remains of the human body. 327 328 implements and weapons may have altered gradually with the lapse of ages, and new forms may have been introduced by commerce and conquest, without any fundamental change in the race using them. still less can language be appealed to as a test of race, for experience shows how easily the language of a superior race may be imposed on populations with which it has no affinity in blood. to establish distinction of races we consult the anthropologist rather than the geologist or philologist.
portrait of mammoth.
drawn with a flint on a piece of mammoth's ivory; from cave of la madeleine, dordogne, france.
earliest portrait of a man with serpents and horses' heads.
from grotto of les eyzies. reindeer period.
reindeer feeding.
from grotto of thayngen, near schaffhausen, switzerland.
on what are the distinctions of the human race founded? mainly on colour, stature, hair, and on the anatomical character of skulls and skeletons. these are wonderfully persistent, and have been so since historical times, intermediate characters only appearing where there has been intercrossing between different races. but the primitive types have continued unchanged, and no one has ever seen a white race of negroes, or a black one of europeans. and this has certainly been the case during the historical period, or for at least 7000 years, for the paintings on old egyptian tombs show us the types of the negro, the libyan, the syrian, and the copt as distinct as at the present day, and the negroes especially, with their black colour, long heads, projecting muzzles, and woolly hair growing in separate tufts, might pass for typical photographs of the african negro of the nineteenth century.
of these indications of race we cannot hope to meet with any of the former class in quaternary gravel or caves. we have to trust to the anatomical character to be drawn from skulls and skeletons, of which it may be inferred, as a matter of course, that they will be few and scanty, and will become constantly fewer and more 329 imperfect as we ascend the stream of time to earlier periods. it must be remembered also that even these scanty specimens of early man are confined almost entirely to one comparatively small portion of the earth, that of europe, and that we have hardly a single pal?olithic skull or skeleton of the black, the yellow, the olive, the copper-coloured, or other typical race into which the population of the earth is actually divided.
we are confined therefore to europe for anything like positive evidence of these anatomical characters of prehistoric and prim?val man, and can only draw inferences from implements as to those of other portions of the earth and other races. fortunately these racial characters are very persistent, especially those of the skull and stature, and they exist in ample abundance throughout the historic, prehistoric, and neolithic ages, to enable us to draw very certain conclusions. thus at present, and as far as we can see back with certainty, the races which have inhabited europe may be classified under the heads, tall and short, long-headed and broad-headed, and those of intermediate types, which latter may be dismissed for the present, though constituting a majority of most modern countries, as they are almost certainly not primitive, but the result of intercrossing.
colour, complexion, and hair are also very persistent, though, as we have pointed out, we have no certain evidence by which to test them beyond the historical period. but the form of skulls, jaws, teeth, and other parts of the skeleton remain wonderfully constant in races where there has been little or no intermixture.
the first great division is in the form of the skull. comparing the extreme breadth of the skull with its 330 extreme length from front to back, if the breadth does not exceed three-fourths or 75 per cent. of the length, the skull is said to be dolicocephalic or long-headed; if it equals or exceeds 83 per cent. it is called brachycephalic, i.e. short or broad-headed. intermediate indices between 75 and 83 per cent. are called sub-dolicocephalic, or sub-brachycephalic, according as they approach one or the other of these extremes, but these are of less importance, as they probably are the result of intercrossing.
the prognathism also of the jaws, the form of the eye-orbits and nasal bones, the superciliary ridges, the proportion of the frontal to the posterior regions of the skull, the stature and proportions of the limbs, are also both characteristic and persistent features, and correspond generally with the type of the skull.
the controversy as to the origin of the aryans has led to a great deal of argument as to these ethnological traits in prehistoric and neolithic times, and the interesting volume of canon taylor's on the origin of the aryans, and professor huxley's article on the same subject in the nineteenth century for november 1890, give a summary of the latest researches on the subject. we shall have to refer to these more fully in discussing the question as to the place or places of human origins; but for the present it is sufficient to state the general result at which the latest science has arrived.
the theory of a common asiatic centre from which all the races of mankind have migrated is given up as unsupported by the slightest vestige of evidence. when we first know anything of the aryan and other european races, we find them occupying substantially very much the same regions as at present. there are four distinct 331 european types, two tall and two short, two long-headed and two broad-headed. of these two were fair, and two dark, and one, apparently the oldest in western europe and in the mediterranean region, and probably represented by the iberians, and now by the spanish basques, was short, dark, and long-headed; a second short, dark, and broad-headed, who are probably represented by the ancient ligurians, and survive now in the auvergnats and savoyards; a third, tall, fair, and long-headed, whose original seats were in the regions of the baltic and north sea, and who were always an energetic and conquering race; and the fourth, like the third, tall and fair, but with broad heads, and possibly not a primitive race, but the result of some very ancient intermixture of the third or northern type with some of the broad-headed races.
now as far back as frequent human remains enable us to form some satisfactory conclusion, that is up to the early neolithic period, we find similar race-types already existing, and to a considerable extent in the same localities. in modern and historical times we find, according to canon taylor, "all the anthropological tests agreeing in exhibiting two extreme types—the african, with long heads, long eye-orbits, and flat hair; and the mongolian, with round heads, round orbits, and round hair. the european type is intermediate—the head, orbits, and sections of hair are oval. in the east of europe we find an approximation to the asiatic type; in the south of europe to the african."
more specifically, we find in europe the four races mentioned above of tall and short long-heads, and tall and short broad-heads. the question is, how far back can any of these races be identified?
332 the preservation of human remains depends mainly on the practice of burying the dead. until the corpse is placed in a tomb protected by a stone coffin or dolmen, or in a grave dug in a cave, or otherwise sheltered from rains, floods, and wild beasts, the chances of its preservation are few and far between. now it is not until the neolithic period that the custom of burying the dead became general, and even then it was not universal, and in many nations even in historical times corpses were burnt, not buried. it was connected doubtless with ideas of a future existence, which either required troublesome ghosts to be put securely out of the way, or to retain a shadowy existence by some mysterious connection with the body which had once served them for a habitation. such ideas, however, only come with some advance of civilization, and it is questionable whether in pal?olithic times the human animal had any more notion of preserving the body after death than the other animals by which he was surrounded.
this neolithic habit moreover of burying, though it preserves many relics of its own time, increases the difficulty when we come to deal with those of an earlier age. a great many caves which had been inhabited by pal?olithic man were selected as fitting spots for the graves of their neolithic successors, and thus the remains of the two periods became intermixed. it is never safe to rely on the antiquity of skulls and skeletons found in association with pal?olithic implements and extinct animals, unless the exploration has been made with the greatest care by some well-known scientific observer, or the circumstances of the case are such as to preclude the possibility of later interments. 333 thus in the famous cavern of aurignac there is no doubt that it had been long a pal?olithic station, and that many of the human remains date back to this period; but whether the fourteen skeletons which were found in it, and lost owing to the pietistic zeal of the mayor who directed their burial, were really pal?olithic, is a disputed point, or rather the better opinion is that they were part of a secondary neolithic interment.
but to return to undoubted neolithic skulls, we have very clear evidence that the four distinct european races already existed. thus in britain we have two distinct forms of barrows or burial tombs, one long, the other round, and it has become proverbial that long skulls go with long barrows, and round skulls with round barrows. the long barrows are the oldest, and belong entirely to the stone age, no trace of metal, according to canon greenwell, having ever been found in them. the skulls and skeletons are those of a long-headed, short, and feeble race, who may be identified with the iberians; while the round barrows contain bronze and finally iron, and the people buried in them were the tall, fair, round-headed gauls or celts of early history, or intermediate types between these and the older race. later came in the tall, fair, and long-headed anglo-saxon and scandinavian races, so that we have three out of the four european types clearly defined in the british islands and traceable in their descendants of the present day. but when we attempt to go beyond the iberians of the neolithic age in britain, we are completely at fault. we have abundant remains of pal?olithic implements, but scarcely a single undoubted specimen of a pal?olithic skeleton, and it is impossible to say whether the men who feasted on the mammoth and 334 rhinoceros in kent's cavern, or who left their rude implements in the high-level gravel of the chalk downs, were tall or short, long-headed or round-headed. on the contrary, there seems a great hiatus between the neolithic and the pal?olithic periods, and, as geikie has shown, this appears to be the case not in england only but in a great part of europe. it would almost seem as if the old era had disappeared with the last glacial period, and a completely new one had been introduced. but although the skulls and bones of pal?olithic races are wanting in britain and scarce everywhere, enough of them have been found in other european countries to enable anthropologists not merely to say that different races already existed at this immensely remote period, but to classify them by their types, and see how far these correspond with those of later times. this has been done especially in france and belgium, where the discoveries of pal?olithic skeletons and skulls have been far more frequent than elsewhere. debierre in his l'homme avant l'histoire, published in the bibliothèque scientifique of 1888, enumerates upwards of forty instances of such undoubted quaternary human remains, of which at least twenty consisted of entire skulls, and others of jaws and other important bones connected with racial type.
the best and latest conclusions of modern anthropology from these remains will be found in this work of debierre's, and in hamy's pal?ontologie humaine, quatrefages' races humaines, and topinard's anthropologie, and it will be sufficient to give a short summary of the results.
the history of quaternary fossil man is divided, in the crania ethnica of quatrefages and hamy, into four 335 races: 1st, the canstadt race; 2nd, the cro-magnon race; 3rd, the races of grenelle and furfooz; 4th, the race of truchere.
the canstadt race, so called from the first skull of this type, which was discovered in the loess of the valley of the rhone near wurtemburg, though it is better known from the celebrated neanderthal skull, which gave rise to so much discussion, and was pronounced by some that of an idiot, by others the most pithecoid specimen of a human skull yet known, in fact almost the long-sought-for missing link.
a still later discovery, however, has set at rest all doubt as to the reality of this neanderthal type, and of its being the oldest quaternary human type known in western europe. in the year 1886 two belgian savants, messrs. fraissent and lohest, one an anatomist, the other a geologist, discovered in a cave at spy near namur two skeletons with the skulls complete, which presented the neanderthal type in an exaggerated form. they were found under circumstances which leave no doubt as to their belonging to the earliest quaternary deposit, being at the bottom of the cave, in the lowest of three distinct strata, the two uppermost of which were full of the usual pal?olithic implements of stone and bone, while the few found in the lowest stratum with the skeletons were of the rudest description. huxley pronounces the evidence such as will bear the severest criticism, and he sums up the anatomical characters of the skeletons in the following terms—
"they were short of stature, but powerfully built, with strong, curiously curved thigh-bones, the lower ends of which are so fashioned that they must have 336 walked with a bend at the knees. their long depressed skulls had very strong brow-ridges, their lower jaws, of brutal depth and solidity, sloped away from the teeth downwards and backwards, in consequence of the absence of that especially characteristic feature of the higher type of man, the chin prominence."
m. fraissent says, "we consider ourselves in a position to say that, having regard merely to the anatomical structure of the man of spy, he possessed a greater number of pithecoid characters than any other race of mankind."
and again he says—
"the distance which separates the man of spy from the modern anthropoid ape is undoubtedly enormous; but we must be permitted to point out that if the man of the quaternary age is the stock whence existing races have sprung, he has travelled a very great way. from the data now obtained, it is permissible to believe that we shall be able to pursue the ancestral type of man and the anthropoid apes still further, perhaps as far as the eocene and even beyond."
this canstadt or neanderthal type was widely diffused early in the quaternary period, having been found in a skull from the breccia of gibraltar, in skulls from italy, spain, austria, sweden, and in france, belgium, and western germany; in fact almost everywhere where skulls and skeletons have been found in the oldest deposits of caves and river-beds, notably in the alluvia of the seine valley near paris, where three distinct superimposed strata are found, each with different human types, that of canstadt being the oldest. wherever explorations have been carefully made it seems to be certain that the oldest race of 337 all in europe was dolicocephalic, and probable that it was of the canstadt type, the skulls of which are all low and long, the length being attained by a great development of the posterior part of the head, which compensates for a deficient forehead.
this type is also interesting because, although the oldest, it shows occasional signs of survival through the later pal?olithic and neolithic ages down to recent times. the skulls of st. manserg, a medi?val bishop of toul, and of lykke, a scientific dane of the last century, closely resemble the neanderthal skull in type, and can scarcely be accounted for except as instances of that atavism, or reversion to old ancestral forms, which occasionally crops up both in the human and in animal species. it is thought by many that these earliest pal?olithic men may be the ancestors of the tall, fair, long-headed race of northern europe; and professor virchow states that in the frisian islands off the north german coast, where the original teutonic type has been least affected by intermixture, the frisian skull unmistakably approaches the neanderthal and spy type. but if this be so, the type must have persisted for an immense time, for, as huxley observes, "the difference is abysmal between these rude and brutal savages, and the comely, fair, tall, and long-headed races of historical times and of civilized nations." at the present day the closest resemblance to the neanderthal type is afforded by the skulls of certain tribes of native australians.
next in antiquity to the canstadt type, though still in the early age when the mammoth and cave-bear were abundant, and the implements and weapons still very rude, a totally different type appears, that of 338 cro-magnon. the name is taken from the skeleton of an old man, which was found entire in the rock shelter of cro-magnon in the valley of the vezere, near the station of moustier, which gave the type of some of the oldest and rudest stone implements of the age of the mammoth. the skeleton was found in the inner extremity of the shelter, buried under a mass of débris and fallen blocks of limestone, and associated with bones of the mammoth and implements of the moustier type, so that there can be no doubt, of its extreme antiquity.
the skull, like that of the canstadt type, is dolichocephalic, but in all other respects totally different. the brow-ridges and generally bestial characters have disappeared; the brain is of fair or even large capacity; the stature tall; the forehead fairly high and well-rounded; the face large; the nose straight, the jaws prognathous, and the chin prominent.
this type is found in a number of localities, especially in the south-west of france, belgium, and italy, and it continued through the quaternary into the neolithic period, being found in the caves of the reindeer age, and in the dolmens. it is thought by some ethnologists to present analogies to the berber type of north africa, and to that of the extinct guanches of the canary islands.
coexistent with or a little later than this type is one of a totally different character both from it and from that of canstadt, viz. that of a brachycephalic race of very short stature, closely resembling the modern lapps. this has been subdivided into the several races of furfooz, grenelle, and truchere, according to the degree of brachycephaly and other features; but practically we 339 may look on these as the results of local variations or intercrossings, and consider all the short, brachycephalic races as forming a third type sharply opposed to those of canstadt and cro-magnon.
we have thus distinct evidence that the quaternary fauna in europe comprised at least three distinct races of pal?olithic men, and there is a good deal of evidence for the existence of a fourth distinct race in america with features differing from any of the european races, and resembling those of the native american men in recent times. but this affords absolutely no clue as to the existence of other pal?olithic types in asia, africa, india, australia, and other countries, forming quite three-fourths of the inhabited world, in which totally different races now exist and have existed since the commencement of history, who cannot possibly have been derived from any of the european types within the lapse of time comprised within the quaternary period.
the negro race is the most striking instance of this, for it differs essentially from any other in many particulars, which are all in the direction of an approximation towards the pithecoid type.
the size of the brain is less, and a larger proportion of it is in the hinder half; the muzzle much more projecting, and the nose flatter; the fore-arm longer; and various other anatomical peculiarities all point in the same direction, though the type remains perfectly human in the main features. it diverges, however, from the known types of quaternary man in europe and from the american type, as completely as it does from those of modern man, and it is impossible to suppose that it can be derived from them, or they from it, in 340 the way of direct descent. if there is any truth in evolution, the negro type must be one of the oldest, as nearest to the animal ancestor, and this ancestor must be placed very far back beyond the quaternary period, to allow sufficient time for the development of such entirely different and improved races.
this will be the more evident if we consider the case of the pygmy negritos and negrillos, who are spread over a wide tropical belt of half the circumference of the earth, from new guinea to western africa. they seem originally to have occupied a large part of this belt, and to have been driven into dense forests, high mountains, and isolated islands, by taller and stronger races, such as the true negro, the melanesian, and the malay, and probably represent therefore a more primitive race. but they had already existed long enough to develop various sub-types among themselves, for although always approaching more to the negro type than any other, the asiatic negrito and the african negrillo and bushman differ in the length of skull, colour, hair, prognathism, and other particulars. but they all agree in the one respect which makes it impossible to associate them with any known quaternary type, either as ancestors or descendants, viz. that of dwarfish stature. as a rule the bushmen and negritos do not average above four feet six inches, and the females three inches less; while in some cases they are as low as four feet—i.e. they are quite a foot shorter than the average of the higher races, and nearly a foot and a half below that of the quaternary cro-magnon and mentone skeletons, and of the modern swedes and scotchmen. and they are small and slightly built in proportion, and by no means deformed specimens 341 of humanity. professor flower suggests that they may be "the primitive type from which the african negroes on the one hand, and the melanesians on the other have sprung." in any case they must certainly have existed as a distinct type in the quaternary period, and probably much earlier. it is remarkable also that the very oldest human implements known get continually smaller as they get older, until those of the miocene, from thenay and puy courny, are almost too small for the hands even of stanley's pygmies. if mere guesses were worth anything, it would be rather a plausible one that the original adam and eve were something between a monkey and an andaman islander.
in concluding this summary of the evidence as to quaternary man, i must remark on the analogy which it presents to that of the historical period dealt with in the earlier chapters. in each case we have distinct evidence carrying us a long way back; in that of the historical period for 7000 years; in that of the quaternary for a vastly longer time, which, if the effects of high eccentricity, postulated by croll's theory, had any influence on the two last glacial periods, cannot be less than 200,000 years, an estimate which is confirmed by the amount of geological work and changes of flora and fauna which have taken place. in each case also the positive evidence takes us back to a state of things which gives the most incontrovertible proof of long previous existence; in the historical case the evidence of a dense population and high civilization already long prevailing when written records began; in the case of pal?olithic man, that of his existence in the same state of rude civilization in the most remote regions, and over 342 the greater part of the habitable earth, his almost uniform progression upwards from a lower to a higher civilization, and his existing at the beginning of the quaternary period already differentiated into races as remote from one another as the typical races of the present day. these facts of themselves afford an irresistible presumption that the origin of the human race must be sought much further back, and it remains to consider what positive evidence has been adduced in support of this presumption.
