William Boyd Dawkins and John Magens Mello

“ Dawkins had said about the human skulls. One was found in a chamber where it was hardly possible man would have got in the Palæolithic times. He replied to Mr. Callard's remarks about the age of the human race.
Rev. O. Fisher stated that another deposit with similar remains had been found half a mile higher up the valley. The horse, abundant at Barnwell, was absent here at Barrington. He did not think gravels could be deposited in an estuary.
Prof. Boyd Dawkins said the Neolithic races of man could be traced in the present European peoples; but not the Palæolithic. ”

“ The Hippopotamus is a survival from the fauna of the Pliocene, and is met with in the Preglacial forest-bed of Norfolk, in the Mid-Pleistocene deposits of the Thames valley, the Post-glacial strata of Bedford, and the caves of Cefn and Pont Newydd, near St. Asaph. The leptorhine Rhinoceros occurs in the fluviatile strata under the Hessle clay near Burghin Lincolnshire [1] , in the brick-earths of the Thames valley, and in the above-mentioned Postglacial caverns. As a rule, these animals are not met with in association with the Mammoth and the Pleistocene stages. ”

“ The Hippopotamus is represented by fragments of skull and the complete molar series of both sides of the upper jaw, one premolar, two upper incisors, all belonging to one individual, a right upper maxillary with the permanent dentition just coming into play and replacing the deciduous series, three lower premolars, a pair of shoulder-blades, and some vertebræ. The remains imply the presence of at least three individuals, in none of which is the adult true molar dentition completed. All are young adults. ”

“ If the accompaning list of Pleistocene species be examined it will be observed that in the older period of the red clay and ferruginous sand the animals inhabiting the district were very different from those found in the succeeding deposits in this and the other caverns. While the Spotted Hyæna, Fox, Bear, and Bison are common to both, the former is characterized by the presence of the Hippopotamus and leptorhine Rhinoceros, and by the absence of the Horse, Woolly Rhinoceros, and Mammoth, as well as by the absence of traces of Man. ”

“ The few human bones discovered in caves, and of undoubted Palæolithic age, seem to me too fragmentary to offer any satisfactory basis for arriving at any ethnological conclusion as to the Palæolithic races of men in Europe. ”

“ At a distance of 19 feet 6 inches from the entrance, and on the north side, a human skull was met with, in a small recess in the wall, at a depth of 2 feet 9 inches from the surface, here in contact with the roof. Close to it, and above it, were the vertebra of a bison and a quartzite splinter. It is, however, in spite of this evidence, in all probability, as we shall see presently, of a later age than the associated Pleistocene remains.
Fig. 5.—Section 4, Chamber B (fig. 1) . ”

“ It must be further remarked that these two animals were among those which the Palæolithic hunter saw when he arrived in this country, in his expeditions along the valleys now covered by the English Channel and the North Sea. They are found in one cave only in Britain, the cave of Pont Newydd, along with Palæolithic implements, which are fashioned out of quartzite, like those of the red sand in the Cresswell Caves [3] . They occur also in the Palæolithic river-gravels of Bedford and Peckham, along with implements of the type Acheulien of De Mortillet. ”

“ The subsequent history of the caves in the prehistoric and historic ages falls more properly within the limits of anthropology than geology, and presents no points of geological interest worthy of being brought before this Society. ”

“ Prof. Seeley said that no river could have occupied the region described by Mr. Fisher, since a slight depression would convert the existing rivulets into estuaries. He thought the gravels were deposited in salt water, and the freshwater shells and bones of land animals had been introduced by small streams. ”

“ The long skulls constituting the "type de Cro-Magnon" belong to an interment which is later than the Palæolithic remains in the rock shelter, because they are above them; and the round skulls of the Trou du Frontal are associated with domestic animals and pottery of a kind not uncommon in the Neolithic age. The so-called fossil man of Mentone may be referred to the same date as the polished stone axe found in the cave, and to be seen in the Museum at St. ”