The most interesting subject for inquiry is the fortune of our human and prehuman forerunners during the Pliocene and Pleistocene periods. It may seem that if we set aside the disputable evidence of the Eoliths and the Java remains we can say nothing whatever on this subject. In reality a fact of very great interest can be established. It can be shown that the progress made during this enormous lapse of time--at least a million years--was remarkably slow. Instead of supposing that some extraordinary evolution took place in that conveniently obscure past, to which we can find no parallel within known times, it is precisely the reverse. The advance that has taken place within the historical period is far greater, comparatively to the span of time, than that which took place in the past. To make this interesting fact clearer we must attempt to measure the progress made in the Pliocene and Pleistocene. We may assume that the precursor of man had arrived at the anthropoid-ape level by the middle of the Miocene period. He is not at all likely to have been behind the anthropoid apes, and we saw that they were well developed in the mid-Tertiary. Now we have a good knowledge of man as he was in the later stage of the Ice-Age--at least a million years later--and may thus institute a useful comparison and form some idea of the advance made. In the later stages of the Pleistocene a race of men lived in Europe of whom we have a number of skulls and skeletons, besides vast numbers of stone implements. It is usually known as the Neanderthal race, as the first skeleton was found, in 1856, at Neanderthal, near Dusseldorf. Further skeletons were found at Spy, in Belgium, and Krapina, in Croatia. A skull formerly found at Gibraltar is now assigned to the same race. In the last five years a jaw of the same (or an earlier) age has been found at Mauer, near Heidelberg, and several skeletons have been found in France (La Vezere and Chapelle-aux-Saints). From these, and a few earlier fragments, we have a confident knowledge of the features of this early human race. The highest appreciation of the Neanderthal man--a somewhat flattering appreciation, as we shall see--is that he had reached the level of the Australian black of to-day. The massive frontal ridges over his eyes, the very low, retreating forehead, the throwing of the mass of the brain toward the back of the head, the outthrust of the teeth and jaws, and the complete absence (in some cases) or very slight development of the chin, combine to give the head what the leading authorities call a "bestial" or "simian" aspect. The frame is heavy, powerful, and of moderate height (usually from two to four inches over five feet). The thigh-bones are much more curved than in modern man. We cannot enter here into finer anatomical details, but all the features are consistent and indicate a stage in the evolution from ape-man to savage man.