8
primitive races. These works are mostly found in the caves of
the continent, but one fragment of bone has been found in a
Derbyshire cave on which the head of a horse is engraved, thus
showing that these British cave-dwellers were probably of the
same stock as those of France, Belgium, and Switzerland.
Fig. 7. Fragment of rib with incised figure of a Horse. From the upper
cave-earth, Robin Hood Cave, Derbyshire. This object is preserved in the
British Museum.
Although man must have passed by gradual development
from the state of culture just described to that of the Later Stone
age, the course of that development is not at present, from the
remains that have been discovered, to be traced in this country.
It is claimed that a better chronological sequence is observable
in the relics that have occurred on the continent. It would
appear that the physical conditions of this country were, for a
considerable period, unsuitable for man and that he succumbed
to the rigors of his environment, or retreated to districts more
congenial.
Between the three succeeding periods the Neolithic, the
Bronze and the Iron Age, there is no difficulty in tracing the
gradual blending and transition from one to the other. These
periods did not occur at the same time in all parts of the world,
but they overlapped and succeeded each other by slow and
gradual processes, in some cases people living side by side in
different stages of culture. The great nations of Assyria and
Egypt, for instance, were established while Britain was probably
still in the Later Stone age. In modern times, remote people
like the Tasmanians, when discovered and until their extermina-
tion, were still in a state approximating to that of our early
Stone Age ; while the use of stone implements is still continued
by the Esquimaux, the natives of New Guinea, the South Sea
Islands, Australia, and many other parts.