implements. The earliest inhabitants of Scotland
were of this Neolithic culture, migrating from the Continent when the
ice-fields of the Great Glaciation had disappeared. Their remains are
often associated with the "Fifty-foot Beach" which, though now high and
dry, was the seashore in early Neolithic days. Much is known about these
men of the polished stones. They were hunters, fowlers, and fishermen;
without domesticated animals or agriculture; short folk, two or three
inches below the present standard; living an active strenuous life.
Similarly, for the south, Sir Arthur Keith pictures for us a Neolithic
community at Coldrum in Kent, dating from about 4,000 years ago--a few
ticks of the geological clock. It consisted, in this case, of
agricultural pioneers, men with large heads and big brains, about two
inches shorter in stature than the modern British average (5 ft. 8 in.),
with better teeth and broader palates than men have in these days of
soft food, with beliefs concerning life and death similar to those that
swayed their contemporaries in Western and Southern Europe. Very
interesting is the manipulative skill they showed on a large scale in
erecting standing stones (probably connected with calendar-keeping and
with worship), and on a small scale in making daring operations on the
skull. Four thousand years ago is given as a probable date for that
early community in Kent, but evidences of Neolithic man occur in
situations which demand a much greater antiquity--perhaps 30,000 years.
And man was not young then!

[Illustration: PAINTINGS ON THE ROOF OF THE ALTAMIRA CAVE IN NORTHERN
SPAIN, SHOWING A BISON ABOVE AND A GALLOPING BOAR BELOW

The artistic drawings, over 2 feet in length, were made by the Reindeer
Men or "Cromagnards" in the time of the Upper or Post-Glacial
Pleistocene, before the appearance of the Neolithic men.]

We must open one more chapter in the thrilling story of the Ascent of
Man--the Metal Ages, which are in a sense still continuing. Metals began
to be used in the late Polished Stone (Neolithic) times, for there were
always overlappings. Copper came first, Bronze second, and Iron last.
The working of copper in the East has been traced back to the fourth
millennium B.C., and there was also a very ancient Copper Age in the New
World. It need hardly be said that where copper is scarce, as in
Britain, we cannot expect to find much trace of a Copper Age.

The ores of different metals seem to have b