Page:The Zoologist, 4th series, vol 1 (1897).djvu/46

20 human creatures of the present time, especially the old males and the children.... The foreheads recede, the large bushy, red eyebrows meet over the nose, the brows are heavy, and deeply overshadow the eyes beneath.... Many of the women have whiskers, beards, and moustaches.... The teeth project slightly in a muzzle-like fashion; the lower jaws are massive and powerful, and the chins slightly recede.... Such ladies as possess lobes to their ears probably have them pierced, and a small feather pushed through the orifice.... The savages sat huddled close together round their fires with fruits, bones, and half-putrid flesh.... Then, as now, quarrels would sometimes arise over meals.... Man at that time was not a degraded animal, for he had never been higher; he was therefore an exalted animal, and represented the highest stage of development of the animal kingdom of his time."

Between this Man and neolithic Man, who polished his stone tools by rubbing them together, but had no knowledge of metals, there is a long lapse of time; but neolithic Man, and we ourselves through him, are lineal descendants of this primeval savage. The gap between them is proposed by some to be bridged over by a mesolithic or intermediate type of Man. The opinion most generally held is that the transition from palæolithic to neolithic Man took place elsewhere than in this country—it is suggested that it might have taken place in Africa—and that in this country there was a long interval of complete depopulation—that the palæolithic peoples all died out, and many centuries passed before the neolithic peoples arrived. It is held by some, however, that here as well as elsewhere there was continuity. Whichever view may be correct, there can be no doubt of the lineal descent, and we may accept it either with pride at having risen so high, or with humiliation at having begun so low, as we please.

The zoologist has therefore an opportunity offered to him of research for the discovery of facts that will throw light on a number of unsolved problems. The missing links leading up to Pithecanthropus, and from him to the pre-palæolithic peoples; the rude workmanship of these latter; the remains of palæolithic Man, and the links between him and neolithic Man, are all subjects upon which research may some day be rewarded by im-