will not help us to fix the exact relation of man to these changes,
because they were in Britain before as well as after the submergence,
and were living throughout in those parts of Europe which were not
submerged. It can only be done in areas where the submergence is
clearly defined. At Salisbury, for instance, the River-drift hunter
may have lived either before, during or after the southern counties
became an island. When, however, he hunted the woolly and leptorhine
rhinoceros, the mammoth, and the horse, in the neighborhood of
Brighton, he looked down upon a broad expanse of sea, in the spring
flecked with small icebergs such as those which dropped their burdens
in Brackelsham Bay. At Abbeville, too, he hunted the mammoth,
reindeer, and horse down to the mouth of the Somme on the shore of
the glacial sea. The evidence is equally clear that the River-drift
hunter followed the chase in Britain after it had emerged from
beneath the waters of the glacial sea, from the fact that the river
deposits in which his implements occur either rest upon the glacial
clays, or are composed of fragments derived from them, as in the
oft-quoted case of Hoxne and Bedford. Further, it is very probable
that he may have wandered close up to the edge of the glaciers
then covering the higher hills of Wales and the Pennine chain. The
severity of the climate in winter at this time in Britain is proved,
not merely by the presence of the Arctic animals, but by the numerous
ice-borne blocks in the river gravels dropped in the spring after the
break-up of the frosts.
The River-drift man is proved, by the implements which he left
behind, to have wandered over the whole of France, and to have
hunted the same animals in the valley of the Loire and the Garrone,
as in the valley of the Thames. In the Iberian peninsula he was
also a contemporary of the African elephant, the mammoth, and the
straight-tusked elephant, and he occupied the neighborhood both of
Madrid and Lisbon. He also ranged over Italy, leaving traces of his
presence in the Abruzzo, and in Greece he was a contemporary of the
extinct pygmy hippopotamus (H. Pentlandi). South of the Mediterranean
his implements have been met with in Oran, and near Kolea in
Algeria, and in Egypt in several localities. At Luxor they have been
discovered by General Pitt-Rivers in the breccia, out of which are
hewn the tombs of the kings. In Palestine, they have been obtained by
the Abbé Richard between Mount Tabor and the Sea of Tiberias; and by
Mr. Stopes between Jerusalem and Bethlehem. Throughout this wide area
the implements, for the most part of flint or of quartzite, are of
the same rude types, and there is no difference to be noted between
the hatchets found in the caves of Cresswell in Derbyshire and those
of Thebes, or between those of the valley of the Somme and those of
Palestine. The River-drift hunter ranged over the Indian peninsula
from Madras as far north as the valley of the Nerbudda. Here we
find him forming part of a fauna in which are species now living
in India, such as the Indian rhinoceros and the arnee, and extinct
types of oxen and elephants. There are two extinct hippopotami in the
rivers, and living gavials, turtles, and tortoises. It is plain,
therefore, that at this time the fauna of India stood in the same
relation to the present fauna as the European fauna of the late
Pleistocene does to that now living in Europe. In both there was a
familiar association of extinct and living forms, from both the genus
hippopotamus has disappeared in the lapse of time, and in both man
forms the central figure.
We are led from the region of tropical India to the banks of the
Delaware, in New Jersey, by the recent discoveries of Dr. C. C.
Abbott. Here, too, living and extinct species are found side by side.
Thus in our survey of the group of animals surrounding man when
he first appeared in Europe, India, and North America, we see
that in all three regions, so widely removed from each other,
the animal life was in the same stage of evolution, and “the old
order” was yielding “place unto the new.” The River-drift man is
proved by his surroundings to belong to the Pleistocene age in all
three. The evidence of Palæolithic man in South Africa seems to
me unsatisfactory, because the age of the deposits in which the
implements are found has not been decided.
The identity of the implements of the River-drift hunter proves that
he was in the same rude state of civilization, if it can be called
civilization, in the Old and New Worlds, when the hands of the
geological clock pointed to the same hour. It is not a little strange
that his mode of life should have been the same in the forests to the
north and south of the Mediterranean, in Palestine, in the tropical
forests of India, and on the western shore of the Atlantic. The
hunter of the reindeer in the valley of the Delaware was to all
intents and purposes the same sort of savage as the hunter of the
reindeer on the banks of the Wiley or of the Solent.
It does not, however, follow that this identity of implements
implies that the same race of men were spread over this vast tract.
It points rather to a primeval condition of savagery from which
mankind has emerged in the long ages which separate it from our
own time. It may further be inferred, from his widespread range,
that the River-drift man (assuming that mankind sprang from one
centre) must have inhabited the earth for a long time, and that his
dispersal took place before the glacial submergence and the lowering
of the temperature in Northern Europe, Asia, and America. It is not
reasonable to suppose that the Straits of Behring would have offered
a free passage, either to the River-drift man from Asia to America,
or to American animals from America to Europe, or _vice versâ_, while
there was a vast barrier of ice or of sea, or of both, in the high
northern latitudes. I therefore feel inclined to view the River-drift
man as having invaded Europe in pre-glacial time along with the other
living species which then appeared. The evidence, as I have already
pointed out, is conclusive that he was also glacial and post-glacial.
In all probability, the birthplace of man was in a warm, if not a
tropical, region of Asia--“in a garden of Eden”; and from this the
River-drift man found his way into those regions where his implements
occur. In India, he was a member of a tropical fauna, and his
distribution in Europe and along the shores of the Mediterranean
proves him to have belonged either to the temperate or the southern
fauna in those regions. It will naturally be asked, To what race can
the River-drift man be referred? The question, in my opinion, can
not be answered in the present stage of the inquiry, because the
few fragments of human bones discovered along with the implements
are too imperfect to afford any clew. Nor can we measure the
interval in terms of years which separates the River-drift man from
the present day, either by assuming that the glacial period was
due to astronomical causes, and then proceeding to calculate the
time necessary for them to produce their result, or by an appeal
to the erosion of valleys, or the retrocession of waterfalls. The
interval must, however, have been very great to allow of the changes
in geography and climate, and the distribution of animals which
has taken place--the succession of races, and the development of
civilization before history began. Standing before the rock-hewn
tombs of the kings at Luxor, we may realize the impossibility of
fixing the time when the River-drift hunter lived in the side of the
ancient Thebes, or of measuring the lapse of time between his days
and the splendor of the civilization of Egypt. In this inquiry I have
purposely omitted all reference to the successor of the River-drift
man in Europe--the Cave man--who was in a higher stage of the hunter
civilization. In the course of my remarks you will have seen that the
story told by the rudely chipped implements found at our very door
forms a part of the wider story of the first appearance of man and of
his distribution on the earth.
MAN’S PRIMITIVE CONDITION
--DUKE OF ARGYLL
As the question of man’s origin is different from the question of his
antiquity, and as the antiquity of man is a different question from
his primitive condition, so again the last question includes within
itself several different matters of inquiry. There is first the
question, What consciousness had primeval man of moral obligation,
and what communion with his Creator? Next there is the question,
What were his innate intellect or understanding? And, thirdly, there
is the question, What was his condition in respect to knowledge,
whether as the result of intuition or as the result of teaching? Sir
J. Lubbock speaks of primeval man as having been in a condition of
“utter barbarism.” But no one, speaking philosophically, has a right
to use such terms as “barbarism” and “civilization” without some
definition of their meaning. What were those faculties which made
the first creature who possessed them “worthy to be called a man”?
A mind capable of reason, disposed to reason, and able to acquire,
to accumulate, and to transmit knowledge--this is the distinctive
attribute of man. The first being “worthy to be so called” must have
had such a mind. But it could not properly be said of such a being,
on the ground merely of his ignorance of mechanical arts, that he
was in a condition of “utter barbarism,” if he were at the same time
conscious of moral obligations and obedient to them.
Wherever a brutal or savage custom prevails it is at once assumed
to be a sample of the original condition of mankind. And this in
the teeth of facts which prove that many of such customs not only
may have been, but must have been, the result of corruption. Take
cannibalism as one of these. Sir J. Lubbock seems to admit that this
loathsome practice was not primeval, probably because he considers it
as unnatural. And so it is--that is to say, it is against the better
nature of man; but the fact of its existence proves that within the
limits of that nature there are elements liable to perversions even
so horrible as this. And so we come upon the fact of the two natures
of man, and of the power of the worst parts of his nature to overcome
the best. It is thus that customs the most cruel and depraved become
established. But if this be the explanation, and the only possible
explanation, of cannibalism, is it not evident that this may also
be the explanation of other customs which are violent and horrible
only in a less degree? Cruel rites of worship and savage customs as
regards marriage and the relation of the sexes come under the same
category. Cannibalism is only an extreme case of a general law, and
it is a crucial test of the fallacy of a whole class of arguments
commonly assumed by those who support the savage theory respecting
the primeval condition of mankind.
The great difficulty of teaching many savages the arts of civilized
life is no proof whatever that the various degrees of advance
toward the knowledge of those arts which are actually found among
semi-barbarous nations may not have been of strictly indigenous
growth. Thus it appears that one tribe of Red Indians, called
“Mandans,” practiced the art of fortifying their towns. Surrounding
tribes, although they saw the advantages derived from this art, yet
never practiced it, and never learned it.
I do not agree with the late Archbishop of Dublin that we are
entitled to assume it as a fact that, as regards the mechanical
arts, no savage race has ever raised itself. Whately says that “the
earliest generations of mankind had received only very limited, and
what may be called elementary, instruction, enough merely to enable
them to make further advances afterward by the exercise of their
natural powers.” But how much was this “enough”? And what is meant
by “instruction,” as distinguished from inborn or intuitive powers
of observation and of reasoning? May not this have been the form in
which the Creator first “instructed” man? For here it is important
to observe that in direct proportion as we assume man’s primitive
condition to have been such as to require elementary teaching, in
the same proportion do we suppose that his primitive condition in
respect to intellect was low and weak. Accordingly, Whately assumes
as an indisputable fact, that man has no instincts such as enable the
lower animals to construct nests, cells, and lairs. My own belief
is that this is an assumption which is not only unproved, but one
which in all probability is false. As Whately himself admits, “man
is an animal” as well as the creatures that are below him. It is
true that he has not instincts of the same kind as they have. But
this is no proof whatever that he has not, and had not originally,
instincts which stand in strict correlation with the peculiarities
of his higher physical organization. There are many facts which go
far to prove that man has, and must always have had, instincts which
afford all that is required as a starting-ground for advance in the
mechanical arts. Few persons have reflected on how much is involved
in the most purely instinctive acts, such as the throwing of a stone
or the wielding of a stick as a weapon of offence. Both these simple
acts involve the great principle of the use of artificial tools. Even
in the most rudimentary form the use of an implement fashioned for a
special purpose is absolutely peculiar to man, and arises necessarily
and instinctively out of the structure of his body. The bodies of
the lower animals are so constructed that such implements as they
are capable of directing are all supplied in the form of bodily
organs. All effects which they desire to produce, or are capable of
producing, are effected directly by the use of those organs under the
guidance of implanted instincts. There are some very curious cases
among the lower animals of a near approach to the principle involved
in the use of tools--that is to say, the use of natural force through
artificial means. Thus the common gray or hooded crow is constantly
in the habit of lifting shell-fish to a certain height in the air
and then letting them fall upon the rocks of the shore in order to
break the shells. Some species of monkey will even use any stone
which may be at hand for the purpose of striking and breaking a
nut. The elephant tears branches from the trees and uses them as an
artificial tail to fan himself and to keep off the flies. But between
these rudiments of intellectual perception and the next step--that of
adapting and fashioning an instrument for a particular purpose--there
is a gulf in which lies the whole immeasurable distance between man
and the brutes. In no case whatever do they ever use an implement
made by themselves as an intermediate agency between their bodily
organs and the work which they desire to do. Man, on the contrary,
is so constructed that in almost everything he desires to do he must
employ an agency intermediate between his bodily organs and the
effect which he wishes to produce. But this necessity, which in one
aspect is a physical disability, is correlated with a mind capable
of invention, and with certain implanted instincts which involve all
the rudiments of mechanical skill. The man who first lifted a stone
and threw it, practiced an art which not one of the lower animals is
capable of practicing. This is an act which in all probability is as
strictly instinctive and natural to man as it is to a dog to bite, or
to a bull to charge. Yet the act involves the idea and the knowledge
of projectile force and of the arts by which direction can be given
to that force. The wielding of a stick is, in all probability, an act
equally of primitive intuition, and from this to the throwing of a
stick, and the use of javelins, is an easy and natural transition.
Simple as these acts are, they involve both physical and mental
powers capable of all the developments which we see in the most
advanced industrial arts.
And here it is important to observe that even if savage races be
taken as the type of man’s primeval condition, the evidence afforded
by these races is all in favor of the conclusion that, as regards his
characteristic mental powers, man has always been man, and nothing
less. There is quite as much ingenuity and skill in the manufacture
of a knife of flint as in the manufacture of a knife of iron. And the
skill displayed by the men who used stone implements is not confined
to that which is involved in the selection of mineral substances
suitable for the purpose. That skill is also eminently displayed in
the use made of those stone implements after they had been fashioned.
The smaller implements of bone, or of horn, or of wood which the
stone knives and hatchets were employed to make are often highly
ingenious, and sometimes eminently beautiful. The truth is that high
qualities of reasoning and ready faculties of observation are called
forth in the inverse ratio of the acquired knowledge with which they
are provided, and from which they start.
It matters not which of the two theories we adopt in regard to the
origin of the human race, whether we suppose it to have proceeded
from one or from two, or even from several different centres of
creation; it matters not whether we suppose with Sir J. Lubbock that
the “first being worthy to be called a man” was born of some inferior
creature, or whether we believe with Whately, that he was truly
human in his powers, but required some “elementary instruction to
enable his faculties to begin their work.” In any case we may safely
assume that man must have begun his course in some one or more of
those portions of the earth which are genial in climate, rich in
natural fruits, and capable of yielding the most abundant return to
the very simplest arts. It is under such conditions that the first
establishment of the human race can be most easily understood; nay,
it is under such conditions only that it is conceivable at all. And
as these are the conditions which would favor the first establishment
and the most rapid increase of man, so also are these the conditions
under which knowledge would most rapidly accumulate, and the earliest
possibilities of material civilization would arise.
Now what are the changes of external circumstance which first, in the
natural course of things, would bring an adverse influence to bear
upon mankind? Here again we are on firm ground, because we know one
great cause which has been always operating, and we know its natural
and inevitable effects. This cause is simply the law of increase. It
is the consequence of that law that population is always pressing
upon the limits of subsistence. Hence the necessity of migrations,
and the force which has propelled successive generations of men
further and further, in ever-widening circles round the original
centre or centres of their birth. Then, as it would always be the
weaker tribes who would be driven from the ground which had become
overstocked, and as the lands to which they went forth were less and
less hospitable in climate and productions, the struggle for life
would be always harder. And so it always happens in the natural and
necessary course of things, that the races which were driven furthest
would be the rudest--the most engrossed in the pursuits of mere
animal existence.
Is it not true that the lowest and rudest tribes in the population of
the globe have been found at the furthest extremities of its great
continents, and in the distant islands which would be the last refuge
of the victims of violence and misfortune? “The New World” is the
continent which presents the most uninterrupted stretch of habitable
land from the highest northern to the lowest southern latitude. On
the extreme north we have the Eskimo, or Inuit race, maintaining
human life under conditions of extremest hardship, even amid the
perpetual ice of the polar seas. And what a life it is! Watching at
the blow-hole of a seal for many hours, in a temperature of 75° below
freezing-point, is the constant work of the Inuit hunter. And when
at last his prey is struck, it is his luxury to feast upon the raw
blood and blubber. To civilized man it is hardly possible to conceive
a life so wretched, and in many respects so brutal, as the life led
by this race during the long lasting night of the Arctic winter.
Not even the most extravagant theorist, as regards the plurality of
human origins, can suppose that there was an Eskimo Adam--that any
man was originally created or developed in the icy regions round the
pole. Here then we have a case, beyond all question, of races driven
by wars and migrations from the more temperate regions of the globe.
So long as they were still in those regions, the ancestors of the
Eskimo must have lived in another manner, and must have had wholly
different habits. The rigors of the region they now inhabit have
reduced this people to the condition in which we now see them, and
whatever arts their fathers knew, suited to more genial climates,
have been, and could not fail to be, utterly forgotten.