Close of the first cycle—Neolithic culture connected with the present—No links between the two ages—Long lapse of time between the two ages—Swiss lake villages—This form of villages widely scattered—Irish cranogs—Fortified villages—Implements and weapons of Neolithic times—Possessed of pottery—Neolithic agriculture—Possessed of domestic animals—Danish shell-heaps— Importance of flint—The art of navigation—Neolithic clothing— Their modes of burial—The question of race—Possible remnants— Connection with the Turanian race—Arrival of the Celts. In the preceding chapters we have sought to learn what we could of the Paleolithic Age. We have seen what strange people and animals occupied the land, and have caught some glimpses of a past that has been recovered to us out of the very night of time. From under the ashes of Vesuvius archæologists have brought to light an ancient city. We gaze on it with great interest, for we there see illustrated the state of society two thousand years ago. But other cities of that time are still in existence, and not only by the aid of tradition and song, but from the pages of history, we can learn of the civilization of the Roman people at the time of the destruction of Pompei; so that, in this case, our knowledge of the past is not confined to one source of information. But no voice of history or tradition, or of existing institutions, speaks to us of the Paleolithic Age. Of that remote time, the morning time of human life, we learn only from the labors of geologists and archæologists. We are virtually dealing with a past geological age. The long term of years thus defined drew to its close amidst scenes of almost Arctic sterility. In all probability, glaciers reflected the sun’s rays from all the considerable hills and mountains of Central and Northern Europe, though forming, perhaps, but a remnant of the great glaciers of the Ice Age. The neighboring seas must have been whitened by the glistening sails of numerous icebergs. Such was the closing scene of Paleolithic life. The first great cycle of human life, as far as we know it now, was concluded in Europe. We do not mean to say that it terminated all over the world. In other regions it survived to far later times. But, in Europe, Paleolithic animals and men had worked out their mission, and we have now to record the arrival and spread of a new race, bringing with them domestic animals, a knowledge of rude husbandry, and many simple arts and industries of which their Paleolithic predecessors were ignorant.