Page:The Zoologist, 4th series, vol 6 (1902).djvu/383

Rh books on such subjects are not numerous; but it is, in fact, surprising that nearly every book in which the antiquity of man is discussed at all, and that has come under the writer's notice, makes a special allusion to these Yenangyoung flints, and the lessons that they teach.

In 'The Wonderful Century,' edition 1901, Mr. A.R. Wallace says, on p. 131, referring to the great antiquity of man:—"But evidence has been steadily accumulating of his existence at the time of the glacial epoch, and even before it; while two discoveries of recent date seem to carry back his age far into preglacial times. These are, first, the human cranium, bones, and works of art which have been found more than a hundred feet deep in the gold-bearing gravels of California..... The other case is that of rude stone implements discovered, by a geologist of the Indian Survey in Burma, in deposits which are admitted to be of at least Pliocene age." In the sixth edition (1900) of 'Prehistoric Times,' p. 402, Lord Avebury, after referring to the Java skull, says:—"Dr. Noetling, of the Geological Survey of India, has also recorded unquestionable flint flakes found in Burma with remains of Rhinoceros perimensis and Hippotherium (Hipparion) antelopinum in strata considered to belong to the Pliocene period." In 'The Races of Man,' by J. Deniker (1900), reference is also made to these flints and the polished bone; and in his popular little book on the 'Story of Primitive Man,' Mr. Edward Clodd also mentions them. No doubt, also, many learned societies, both in England and Germany, have published papers on the subject.

There has thus sprung up round these flints a more or less considerable literature, and, taking them together with the polished bone, the tendency has been to accept them as evidences of the existence of man at a time when the ferruginous conglomerate at Yenangyoung was being deposited, and when the beasts whose remains (chiefly teeth) are found in that deposit were walking the earth. Already we seem to be on a bowing acquaintance with our rude ancestors of pre-glacial times. They chipped flints into flakes, breaking down the angle at the base, no doubt to fix into a handle; while some flakes, that were not so well fitted for arrow-heads, they doubtless used in the hand as scrapers. After a good meal off a thigh of Hippopotamus