To make up for these losses, numerous herds of reindeer now inhabit the forests of western Europe. In that part of the continent which was one day to be called France, these animals make their way as far as the Pyrenees. The horse (_Equus caballus_), in no way different from the present species, is the companion of the above-named valuable ruminant; also the bison (_Biso europæus_), the urus (_Bos primigenius_), the musk-ox (_Ovibos moschatus_), the elk, the deer, the chamois, the ibex, and various species of rodents, amongst others, the beaver, the hamster-rat, the lemming, the spermophilus, &c. After the intense cold of the glacial period the temperature has become sensibly milder, but it is still much lower than at the present day in the same countries; as the reindeer, an animal belonging to a hyperborean climate, can both enjoy life and multiply in the comparatively southern part of Europe. The general composition of the _fauna_ which we have just described is a striking proof of the rigorous cold which still characterised the climate of central Europe. Animals which then inhabited those countries are now only met with in the high northern latitudes of the old and new worlds, in close proximity to the ice and snow, or on the lofty summits of great mountain-chains. To localities of this kind have now retired the reindeer, the musk-ox, the elk, the chamois, the wild-goat, the hamster-rat, the lemming and the spermophilus. The beaver, too, is at the present day confined almost entirely to Canada. Mr. Christy, an English naturalist, has remarked with much acuteness that the accumulations of bones and other organic remains in caves actually imply the existence of a rigorous climate. Under the influence of even a merely moderate temperature, these accumulations of bones and animal remains would, in fact, have given forth putrid exhalations which would have prevented any human being from living in close contiguity to these infectious heaps. The Esquimaux of the present day live, in this respect, very much like the people of primitive ages, that is, close by the side of the most fetid _débris_; but, except in the cold regions of the north, they would be quite unable to do this. [Illustration: Fig. 39.--Man of the Reindeer Epoch.] What progress was made by the man of the reindeer epoch (fig. 39) beyond that attained by his ancestors? This is the question we are about to consider. But we must confine the sphere of our study to the only two countries in which a sufficient number of investigations have been made in respect to the epoch of the reindeer. We allude to that part of Europe which nowadays forms France and Belgium.