They make war against and destroy the early barbarians; they
burn their water-huts, and force them to the mountains, or to the most
northern portions of the continent. This new race has a taste for
objects of beauty. They work copper and bronze; they make use of
beautiful vases of earthenware and ornaments of the precious metals;
but they have yet no knowledge of iron or steel. Their dead are burned
instead of being buried, as was done by the preceding races. They are
evidently more warlike and more advanced than the Finnish barbarians. Of
their race or family it is difficult to say anything trustworthy. Their
skulls belong to the "long-skulled" races, and would ally them to the
Kelts. Antiquaries have called their remains "Keltic remains."

Still another age in this ancient history is the "Iron Age," when the
tribes of Europe used iron weapons and implements, and had advanced from
the nomadic condition to that of cultivators of the ground, though still
gaining most of their livelihood from fishing and hunting. This period
no doubt approached the period of historical annals, and the iron men
may have been the earliest Teutons of the North,--our own forefathers;
but of their race or mixture of races we have no certain evidence,
and can only make approximate hypotheses,--the division of "ages" by
archaeologists, it should be remembered, being not in any way a fixed
division of races, but only indicating the probability of different
races at those different early periods. What was the date of these ages
cannot at all be determined; the earlier are long before any recorded
European annals, but there is no reason to believe that they approach in
antiquity the Asiatic records and remains.

Such, until recently, were the historic and scientific evidences with
regard to the antiquity of man. His most venerable records, his most
ancient dates of historic chronology were but of yesterday, when
compared with the age of existing species of plants and animals, or
with the opening of the present geologic era. Every new scientific
investigation seemed, from its negative evidence, to render more
improbable the existence of the "fossil man." It is true that in various
parts of the world, during the past few years, human bones have been
discovered in connection with the bones of the fossil mammalia; but they
were generally found in caves or in lime-deposits, where they might
have been dropped or swept in by currents of water, or inserted