190 Notes on the Evidence bearing
forbids any speculation as to the race to which they belonged.
He is, however, inclined to consider the cave-man of Britain
and Western Europe to be represented at the present day by
the Eskimo, on account of the unusual aptitude, common to
both races, of reproducing animal forms on their implements
and ornaments, a talent not found in Neolithic man. This
view is opposed by Prof. Flower,2 who states that the Eskimo
are such an intensely specialised race "that it is probable
that they are of comparatively late origin, and were not, as a
race, contemporaries with the men whose rude flint tools
found in our drifts excite so much interest and speculation as
to the makers." He adds that the Eskimo have evidently
been derived from the same stock as the Japanese. And
when we turn to illustrations given by Prof. Boyd Dawkins
of Palaeolithic and Eskimo drawings3 we cannot fail to notice
that the artistic aptitudes of Palaeolithic man were far superior
to those of the Eskimo of our own day. 'The presumption
therefore seems to be against Prof. Boyd Dawkins's view.
No pottery of Palaeolithic age has yet been discovered. With
the negative conclusion that we know nothing of the racial
affinities of British Palaeolithic man, I pass on to his Neo-
lithic successor.
Of Neolithic man the remains are both more numerous and
more important. In many parts of Britain barrows exist,
containing not only his indestructible flint-implements, but
occasionally his pottery and even his bones. These barrows
are especially numerous on the Yorkshire. Wolds and on
Salisbury Plain, and many of them in various parts have
been explored by Sir Richard Colt Hoare, Bateman, Thurnam,
Greenwell, and other investigators. Their researches tend to
show that the small long-headed (dolicho-cephalic) Neolithic
people, the remains of whose chiefs are found in British long
barrows, once spread over the whole of our islands, and that
they are well represented among us at the present day,
though usually more or less modified by succeeding races.
Most writers are inclined to think the shorter and darker
2 Journ. Anthrop. Inst., vol. xiv., pp. 387-8 (May, 1885).
3 'Early Man in Britain,' pp. 216, 217, 221, 238, 239.