selves; the second, that of the garden beds; and the third, that of the forests.

But American agriculture was not imported from abroad; it resulted from, and in return rendered possible, the gradual development of American semi-civilisation. This is proved by the fact, that the grains of the Old World were entirely absent, and that American agriculture was founded on the Maize, an American plant. Thus, therefore, we appear to have indications of four long periods.

1. That in which, from an original barbarism, the American tribes developed a knowledge of agriculture and a power of combination. 2. That in which the mounds were erected and other great works undertaken.

3. The age of the "garden beds," which occupy some at least of the mounds. Hence it is evident that this cultivation was not until after the mounds had lost their sacred character in the eyes of the occupants of the soil; for it can hardly be supposed that works executed with so much care would be thus desecrated by their builders.

And 4. The period in which man relapsed into barbarism, and the spots which had been first forest, then (perhaps) sacred monuments, and thirdly cultivated ground; relapsed into forest once

more.

But even if we attribute to these changes all the importance which has ever been claimed for them, they will not require an antiquity of more than three thousand years. We do not, of course, deny that the period may have been very much greater, or very much less, but, in our opinion at least, it need not be greater. At the same time there are other observations, which, if they shall eventually prove to be correct, would indicate a very much greater antiquity.

One of these is an account "given of a Mastodon found in Gas"conade County, Missouri, which had apparently been stoned to "death by the Indians, and then partially consumed by fire. The "pieces of rock, weighing from two to twenty-five pounds each, which "must have been brought from a distance of four or five hundred "yards were,' says the narrator, 'evidently thrown with the inten"tion of hitting some object.' Intermixed with burned wood and "burned bones, were broken spears, axes, knives, &c., of stone." This statement, which, if true, is of the highest importance, is given by Mr. Haven without a word of caution, and is repeated by Dr. Wilson. Both these gentlemen refer to the American Journal of Sciences and Art' (First Series, Vol. xxxvi. p. 199), as if they were quoting from an article communicated to that respectable journal. Now, the fact is, that the only authority for the statement is an anonymous correspondent of the Philadelphia Presbyterian.' The editor of the American Journal, while reprinting the communication, † L. c. v. i. p. 112.

* L. c. p. 142.

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inserted a notice requesting the author to make himself known and to give some more particulars. I cannot, however, ascertain that, in answer to this appeal, any one came forward to take upon himself the responsibility of so important an observation.

Nor is this all. The original communication to the 'Philadelphia Presbyterian' never alludes to the Mastodon at all, but refers the skeleton to the Mammoth; and the Mastodon was first suggested by the editor of the American Journal. Under these circumstances it certainly seems to us that some better evidence will be required before we can be expected to believe that any Mastodon was ever stoned to death by North American Indians. There are, indeed, upon record other facts of a similar tendency. We have, however, already exceeded our limits, and we will therefore defer the consideration of them to some future opportunity.

If, however, the facts above recorded justify the conclusion that parts at least of North America once supported a numerous and agricultural population, then we cannot but ask, What fatal cause has destroyed this earlier civilisation? Why are these fortifications forsaken-these cities in ruins? How were the populous nations which once inhabited the rich American valleys reduced to the poor tribes of savages which the Europeans found there? History suggests by luxury or war. And the Archæologist, if he perceive little evidence of the first, finds abundant proof of the second. Did, then, the North and the South once before rise up in arms against one another? “Did the terrible appellation of "The Dark and Bloody Land,' applied to Kentucky, commemorate these ancient wars ?" Absit omen. Let us hope that our kinsmen in America may yet pause ere they, in like manner, sacrifice a common prosperity to a mutual hatred.

II. PREHISTORIC MAN: RESEARCHES INTO THE ORIGIN OF CIVILISATION IN THE OLD AND NEW WORLD. By Daniel Wilson, LL.D.

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THIS work would have corresponded more nearly with its title if it had been called An Introduction to American Archæology,' or, in accordance with Dr. Wilson's earlier work, 'The Prehistoric Annals of America.' It is true that he has some general chapters; such as one on "Speech," another on Instinct," and a third on "Fire," or, as he prefers to call them, "The Primeval Occupation: Speech," "The Primeval Transition: Instinct," and "The Promethean Instinct: Fire." The second of these headings we must confess that we cannot understand, nor have two careful perusals of the chapter itself thrown any light upon the meaning; but surely "speech" is as much an occupation now as it was in the earliest times? However this may be, these chapters are at least general and correspond to the title of the work, while by far the larger part of the work is entirely devoted to the description of American antiquities.

In some respects, perhaps, Dr. Wilson's work might be shortened with great advantage; thus, in alluding to Kent's Cavern, it was surely unnecessary to transcribe Macaulay's well-known description of Torquay. Extensive reading, great power of word-painting, and impetuous enthusiasm render Dr. Wilson's statements sometimes obscure if not contradictory. His very last paragraph is an eloquent expression of his satisfaction that, in the light which archaology has thrown on the age of man, there is" a welcome evidence of "harmony between the disclosures of science and the dictates of reve"lation." Had, then, the Doctor any secret misgivings on this point? Such a state of mind is a mystery to us; but, indeed, this is not the only occasion in which the Doctor, clear enough on purely scientific questions, becomes unintelligible as soon as he treads on sacred ground. For instance, at the close of his chapter on the "Primeval Instinct," he says, "And now that it seems almost certainly demon"strable on archæological, and also on geological grounds, that the "human family was widely dispersed over the face of the earth at the "earliest possible date at which we can reconcile chronologies of "science and revelation, possibly some may be tempted to return to "their old convictions, that when all the fountains of the great deep "were broken up, and the windows of heaven were opened, and the "rain was upon the earth forty days and forty nights; and the waters "prevailed exceedingly upon the earth; and all the high hills that were under the whole heaven were covered,' that it actually was so." The logic of this sentence has puzzled us very much, but the following statements with reference to instinct and reason are still more bewildering.

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"of

In Vol. i. p. 94, he says-"The Palæontogists' one perfect specimen of an extinct species, is for every purpose of science a specimen of all examples of such; even as the naturalists' history of one specific zoophyte, ant, or beaver, is the history of all;" their works, as of their organic structure, one example is a sufficient "type of the whole;" and then, after a quotation from Montgomery's Pelican Island,' he goes on to contrast this invariability of instinct with the diversity of human art. "But with the relics of human art, even in its most primitive and rudimentary forms, it is far otherwise. Each example possesses an individuality of its own;" and his conclusion is that "the instincts of the inferior orders of creation are in vain "compared with the devices of man." Now, in P. 161, he says“The bee, according to Huber, when interrupted in its cell-building operations, adapted its structure to the novel circumstances imposed "on it, altering the otherwise invariable hexagon. The bird, in like manner, accommodates the form of its nest to the peculiarities of the "chosen locality; as if making the instinctive process subservient to the "rational." Thus the cell and the nest which were so invariable in p. 94, are, in p. 161, modified as soon as "novel circumstances are imposed on" them. So also the individuality which, according to p. 94, is impressed on every example of human art, vanishes, in p. 264,

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as soon as we attempt to grapple with it. The primitive implements met with in ancient workings in Anglesea "correspond exactly with "those found on the shores of Lake Superior;" and "the modern "flint-lance or arrow-head of the Red Indian can scarcely be distinguished from that found in the most ancient British graves;" while in Vol. ii. p. 109, the pottery of the North American Indians has become as unvarying as the nest-building instinct of birds," which, however, as we have already seen, changes as soon as circumstances

alter.

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But, according to Dr. Wilson (Vol. i. p. 450), the remarkable correspondence between the domestic and sepulchral pottery of the Old and New World "is only the inevitable correspondence of the inartistic simplicity inseparable from all infantile art." If, then, "infantile art" shows such an "inevitable correspondence," how does he know that in the case of animals "Their most ingenious "works cost them no intellectual effort to acquire the craft, and experience adds no improvements in all the continuous labours of the "wonderful mechanicians ?" or how does he reconcile this with the very next paragraph, in which he says, "The ant and the beaver, the "coral zoophyte and the bee, display singular ingenuity and powers "of combination; and each feathered songster builds its nest with "wondrous forethought." Granting that the coral zoophyte displays singular ingenuity, which we are sure will be a new fact to naturalists, and admitting that birds show wondrous forethought, we should like to know how they manage to do so without any intellectual effort.

But we are thoroughly puzzled and bewildered, we can form no idea of what Dr. Wilson's opinions on these subjects really are, and our only conclusion is that, in the words of Lord Dundreary, it is one of those things which no fellow can understand.

But we should be doing the author great injustice if we were to insinuate that this is a fair specimen of the work. On the contrary, in spite of some deficiency of method, and a certain fulness of habit, the book is very readable, and may be recommended as an introduction to more special works on Archæology. The figures also are numerous and good.

In the chapter on "Narcotic Arts and Superstitions," he discusses at some length the question, whether smoking was known in Europe before the time of Columbus, as has been inferred by some antiquaries from the "Elfin pipes," which have been said to be found under circumstances implying great antiquity, and even on one occasion with a stone hatchet, and some arrow-heads. On the whole, he confesses, "that a full consideration of all the bearings of this disclosure of the sources of modern popular belief has greatly modified "the faith I once attached to such forms of tradition as memorials of "the past."

His account of the remarkable earthworks and tumuli which are so numerous in the United States, though containing little new, is

well written, and will repay an attentive perusal. He gives also an amusing and instructive history of the various opinions which have been held by different Archeologists, on the nature of the Dighton Rock inscriptions, and some other doubtful relics; but as these antiquities are the subject of a special article which appears in another part of this review, we shall not here enter into any discussion of them.

In the chapter entitled "Ante-Columbian Traces: Colonization," Dr. Wilson examines the evidence as to a Scandinavian discovery of North America, and the conclusion to which he arrives is the following: "That the old Northmen visited some portions of the Ameri"can coasts appears to be confirmed by most credible testimony; but "that their presence was transient, and that they left no enduring "evidence of their visits, seems little less than certain."

The dictum of Ulloa, " He who has seen one tribe of Indians, has "seen all," and the inference that the various nations of America (always excepting the Esquimaux) constitute a single variety of Man, have generally been accepted as true by American Ethnologists. "Lawrence, Wiseman, Agassiz, Squier, Gliddon, Nott, and Meigs might each be quoted in confirmation of this opinion." It has also the support of Morton, who, however, noticed the differences between the skulls of different tribes, but attributed them to artificial distortion. To this curious habit Dr. Wilson devotes a separate chapter, which is a valuable addition to our knowledge of the subject, and we regret that our space does not permit us to do justice to the facts which he has brought together. "The artificial forms," he says, "given to the human head by the various tribes among whom "the custom has been practised in ancient and modern times, though "divided by Dr. Gosse, of Geneva, into sixteen classes, range be"tween two extremes. One of these is a combined occipital and "frontal compression, reducing the head as nearly as possible to a "disk, having its mere edge laterally The other form, "which is more common among the Flat-head tribes on the Columbia "river and its tributaries, depresses the forehead, and throws back "the whole skull .. Fashion regulates to some extent the "special form given to the head among various tribes, but this is " modified by individual caprice, and a considerable variety is obser"vable in the strange shapes which it is frequently forced to assume." As illustrations he gives figures of a Nematee chief, a Flat-head child, anfl Caw-we-litcks, a Flat-head woman."

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It is certainly difficult to believe that such changes as are here portrayed can be produced without injury, and yet we are assured that they affect neither the health nor the intellect.

While, however, Dr. Wilson fully appreciates the importance of these observations, he denies that all the differences which distinguish the form of the head in different tribes, can be thus accounted for. He gives careful measurements of many American skulls, both ancient and modern, and after comparing them together he sums up the question as follows: "If differences of cranial conformation of