The Mineral argus., 1884-03-27
A PREHISTORIC RACE.

Tne Ancient Reindeer Hunters in the
Valleys ofthe Delaware, the Thames
and the Seine-Scenes that May
Have Been Witnessed Where Lon
don and Paris Now stand.
From the North American Review.
Who were the earliest inhabitants of
America, and when did they live? are
questions which have generally been APP
preached solely from the point of view
offered by discoveries in the United
States, and, until within the last three
or four years, have been discussed only
on the slender basis of the CaIaveras
skull and the implements found in gold
mining in California. In the following
essay l propose TO deal with them as
portions of one great problem common
to she Old and new Worlds, and TO
show that the first traces of man, as vet
discovered, prove him to have lived in
the same low stage Of culture on both
sides of the Atlantic, at a time when the
hands ofthe geological clock pointed to
the same hour over the greater part of
the world. The story of early man in
America is a part of the greatest story o
the FIRST appearance of man on the earth,
so far as he has yet been revealed by
modern discovery.
The change in life has been so regular.
definite, and orderly in the geological
past that it enables III to classify the
rocks over the whole world into prima-
nv. secondary, and tertiary 0s. In
the last of these the higher types of
mammalia become more and more spe-
cialized as we draw nearer to the from
tiers Of history; and their pedigrees.
when traced from one period to anoth.
er. assume the shape of genealogical
trees, such as that which Prof. Marsh
has discovered for the horse. The liy-
ing orders first appear in the Eoene.
the living eeLera ii the Miocene a
few living species in the Pliocene, while
nearly all the living species come in the
Pleitocene division. Again, in the in
terval dividing the last from the historic
period, the domestic animals appear and
the cultivated fruits, and this-the Pre-
histOric-gradually passes into the peri
cd embraced by the written records. y
. = The most highly specialized form
in the animal kingdom cannot be looked
for until the lower animals by which he
is now surrounded made their appear
ance. We cannot imagine him to have
been living in the Eocene age, when
animal life was not sufficiently
differentiated to present us with
living genera of placental mammals.
Nor is there any probability of his hav-
ing appeared on the earth in the
Mlocene, because of the absence of pla-
GENITAL mammals belonging to living spe-
cies. 1t is most unlikely that man should
appear in a fauna in which there was no
other living mammal. He belongs TO a
more advanced stage of evolution than
that presented by the mid-Miocene of
Thenay in which flint splinters fashioned
by man are said to have occurred. Up
to this time the evolution of the animal
kingdom had advanced no further than
in the direction of man, and
the apes then haunting the forests of
Italy, France, and Germany, were the
most highly organized types. We may
also look at the question from another
point of view. If a man were upon the
earth in the Miocene age, il is incredi-
BILE that he should not have become
something else while those changes
were going on in the conditions of life
by which all the Miocene land mamma
liza have been so profoundly affected
that they have either assumed new
forms or been exterminated. 1t is i'm
pOS5lUAC 10 DGlltN6 tlldL ludu SlOulu nave
been an exception to the law of change.
Nor in the succeeding Pliocene age can
expect to find traces of man upon
the earth. > . ; '"The fossil man of
Denise" is of uncertain age, and other
cases of PlIocene man in Europe
have now been given up.
The question has, however, been re-
in the United States by Prof.
Whitney in his work on the "Auriferous
Iravels of California" and the existence
Of man in California in the Pliocene age
has been accepted by such high author
ties as Marsh. lie Conte, and others. 1t
becomes, therefore, necessary for us to
see how the facts will stand the test of
criticism. In the first place, it is as
that the auriferous gravels in the
with traces of man, which are in
places 800 feet thick and sometimes coy
cred with ancient lava streams, are of
PliOcene age. They are, however, proved
their fossils, identified by DIR. Leidy
have been deposited by the streams
rom the Miocene (Elotherium) age
down to the present time. Among the
animals we may note the skull offs mus
.ang, identical with that of Mexico and
California, which could not have been bu-
RED in the gravels of Sierra county be-
fore the time of the Spanish conquest.
the living race of horses was intro
Consequently the d~iscOverer of
human remains in the auriferous gravels
Ices not prove that man was an inhabi-
tant of Pliocene America, even if it be
that they are of the same age
the strata in which they live. There
Is however, no evidence of this in any
one lnstan &c. The objects themselves
point to a diTectlV %OOnOsite c~OncluSiOO.