THE ANTIQUITY OF MAN.

Daily Telegraph (Napier), Issue 3127, 6 July 1881, Page 3

THE ANTIQUITY OF MAN.

[To the Editor of the Daily Telegraph.] Sir,—l shall be obliged if you will insert a clipping anent the Devonshire caves, and their supposed evidence of the antiquity of man. It is as follows: — "Victoria (Philosophical) Institute of England.—A meeting of this Society took place on the 21st of February, at 7 Adelphi Terrace, London, when a paper 1 On the Implements of the Stone Age as Primitive Demarcation between Man and other Animals,' by the late Dr. Thompson, L.L.D., of Harvard University, was read; after which a second brief paper on the Caves of Devonshire was read by Mr Howard, F.R.S., in which the author, as a chemist, pointed out the important bearing tftat the new investigations into the mode of formation of tne cave floors had upon the whole question at issue, a bearing so important as to nidify all the calculations as to their age hitherto so persistently advanced. The object of the Society is to investigate impartially all questions of philosophy and science said to militate against the truth of revelation, and it appears that last year nearly half the new members were American or Colonial, and this proportion has not lessened this year, especially as all wishing the Society well are eligible as associates —a subscription of one guinea entitling them to the year's publications." This will show that the hypothetical calculations as to man's extreme antiquity connected with these caves are very far from being final or conclusive. —I am, &c, Wm. Nichol. July 6, 1881.