has been in existence 100,000 years, we must believe that with all the dust there is in the air, and all the soil which would wash down the steep incline of the sides, and all the vegetable matter falling into the depression, or forming in it year after year, one thousand years would be required for one inch of sediment to accumulate! If we reduce this supposed period to 50,000, 25,000, and 12,500 years successively, the time required for the accumulation of an inch of sediment would be proportionally 500, 250, and 125 years. If the reader will divide an inch into one hundred and twenty-five equal parts, he will probably be surprised at the insignificance of the quantity. The slowest rate which Boucher de Perthes calculates for the accumulation of peat over Roman pottery in the valley of the Somme is three centimeters, or a little over an inch, in a century.

We do not bring railing accusation against those who, from astronomical considerations, confidently speak of the close of the glacial period as an event which occurred scores of thousands of years ago; but it is important that they know what other beliefs that long chronology carries with it. If any one chooses to believe that kettleholes can stand 100,000 years, and fill up only twenty-four feet from the apex of the inverted cone, he must run the risk of being considered credulous.

Altogether, these considerations have led us to look with increasing distrust upon the astronomical calculations that are made concerning the glacial period, unless it may be supposed that the moraine of which we have spoken marks the limit reached at the last semi-revolution of the earth's equinoxes, about 10,000 years ago. It is, however, to be observed that glacial deposits as far south as New Jersey are somewhat earlier than those in Minnesota and New England, since some time is required for so much northerly retrocession of the ice-front to take place. But we have much to indicate that this retrocession was rapid; while nothing compels us to assign a difference in date of more than a few hundred years.

The foregoing estimates shortening the period separating us from the glacial epoch should be as grateful to the Darwinian as to the theologian; for the changes in animals and plants since the glacial period have been so slight, that if the epoch be set too far back eternity itself would scarcely suffice to account for all the divergences which have arisen.

Nor need we associate the glacial age with universal gloom. In Greenland man still lives amid the scenes and occupations of those who followed the retreating glacier in lower latitudes. Even at the time of the greatest extension of ice,

there were sunny skies and green fields everywhere to the south of its extreme limits.

XVII. Man is Man even in the Savage State.

A study of even the earliest and rudest indications of human art impresses one with the contrast between man in his lowest estate and the brute creation in the higher.

When Robinson Crusoe found on the sand the imprint of a single human footstep he was filled with amazement and concern. So when geologists discern in ancient river gravels a single flint instrument they have made a most significant discovery regarding the condition of the world.

Whatever characteristics man may share with the brute creation, the gap between the lowest man and the highest animal is an enormous one, and it is difficult to see how there can be anything but an abrupt passage from one to the other.

We are accustomed greatly to underrate the intellectual capacity of the individual savage, and to overrate the mental calibre of civilized man. The average wit of a savage is higher than that of the civilized man. Doubtless if a promiscuous company of the most highly cultivated persons were turned out into the woods to get their living by the arts of savage life, ninety-nine in a hundred of them would be unequal to the task.

A modern novelist1 illustrates this point by representing a company of Europeans as lost in the wilds of Australia. When their food became exhausted, and their supply of ammunition failed, they turned in despair to a native who was with them, and said, "What shall we do; our food has failed us!" The self-contained savage laughed, and said, "Me find plenty food"; and with a little hook forthwith began to draw worms out from under the bark of trees, and to resort to various other devices for satisfying hunger, - devices of which civilized man was totally ignorant, and for which his stomach was poorly prepared.

In a civilized state man is strong through the organization of society and the co-operation of its individuals; but when dissevered from that organization, he is very helpless. Greater individual skill is required to hit an object with a boomerang than with a shot-gun. It requires more personal ability to kill an elephant with bows and arrows and sharp sticks than with breech-loading rifles. When David bearded the lion and the bear he displayed more manly qualities than a modern hunter shooting with a rifle from behind a tree.

The greatest inventive genius which the world has ever seen was the man who taught his fellows how to produce fire at will. One can easily believe that the art was stolen from heaven, or imparted

1 Charles Reade.

by direct communication of an angel. Any ignoramus might learn to warm himself by a volcano, or to boil his meat in the water of a hot spring; but the places at which he could do this are very rare. So any one might derive a temporary advantage from a burning tree that had been struck by lightning. But how should he learn to kindle a fire for himself whenever he wanted it? When one has a fire and an iron kettle it is easy enough to boil a dinner; but when one has no fire and no lucifer matches and no kettle, what can he do in a cold climate? And yet Palaeolithic man had means for making fires and for boiling his food. We know he had fire, for we find charcoal in the caverns; and we find the round stones with which to heat water. He could not have done as our grandfathers did, use flint and steel, for it was before the days of iron. Hence, doubtless we may infer that he resorted to the process in vogue among savage nations at the present time a process requiring more patience and skill than is now requisite to run a locomotive. He had learned to rub two sticks together, or to whirl one stick pivoted upon another till the friction produced fire.

We do not reflect sufficiently on the value of the gifts we have received from people who were in a comparatively barbarous condition. As we have seen, nearly all the animals were domesticated in