We here close our enumeration of the various sources of the
archæological records which have served to reconstruct the history of
primitive man during that period of the stone age which we have
designated under the name of the epoch of the great bear and the
mammoth. Before concluding our remarks as to this period, there is one
question which we must enter upon, although there is a great deficiency
in any positive records by which it might be solved. What was the
organic type of man during this epoch? Could we, for instance, determine
what amount of intellect man possessed in this earliest and ancient date
of his history?
The answer to this question--although a very uncertain answer--has been
supposed to have been found in the caves of Engis and Engihoul, of which
we have just spoken as having been explored by Schmerling with such
valuable results.
The cave of Engis contained the remains of three human beings, among
which were two skulls, one that of a youth, the other that of an adult.
The latter only was preserved, the former having fallen into dust while
it was being extracted from the ground. Two small fragments of a human
skull were likewise found at Engihoul; also a great many of the bones of
the hands and feet of three individuals.
The Engis skull has been a subject of protracted argument to the
palæontologists and anatomists of the present day. Floods of ink have
been spilt upon the question; discussions without end have taken place
with respect to this piece of bone, in order to fix accurately the
amount of intellect possessed by the inhabitants of Belgium during the
epoch of the great bear and the mammoth. Up to a certain point the
development of the brain may, in fact, be ascertained from the shape of
the cranial envelope, and it is well known that a remarkable similarity
exists between the cerebral capacity and the intellectual development of
all mammiferous animals. But in a question of this kind we must
carefully avoid a quicksand on which anthropologists too often make
shipwreck; this danger consists in basing a theory on a too limited
number of elements, and of generalising conclusions which are perhaps
drawn from one special case. Because we find a portion of a skull--not
even a whole skull--belonging to a human being contemporary with the
great bear, we assume that we can determine the amount of intellect
possessed by man during this epoch. But what proof have we that this
skull is not that of an idiot, or, on the contrary, the skull of an
individual possessing a superior degree of intelligence? What deduction
can be logically drawn from the examination of one single skull? None
whatever! "_Testis unus testis nullus_;" and what is said by
jurisprudence, which is nothing but good sense in legal
matters--science, which is nothing but good sense in learned questions,
ought likewise to repeat. If we found ten or twelve skulls, each
presenting the same characteristics, we should be justified in thinking
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