that this missing
link has perished in the submergence of an imaginary continent of
Lemuria, in the Indian Ocean; and it is instructive to observe that,
after deducting this, his affiliation of the races of men, as
indicated in a map of the distribution of the species, is in the main
very similar to that with which we are familiar in ordinary
collections of maps illustrative of the Bible.

The Post-glacial, Palaeocosmic, or Palaeolithic men of Europe are not
improbably antediluvian; and as to their precise date we know little.
As to postdiluvian man, Canon Rawlinson has recently pointed out[155]
the remarkable convergence of all historic dates toward a time between
2000 to 3000 years B.C., or about the date of the Biblical deluge,
which may reasonably be inferred to have occurred about 3200 B.C. He
gives the following summary of historical origins as ascertained from
the best data, and which accord with the representation of the Bible
that in the time of Abraham the great monarchies of Egypt and the East
were scarcely more powerful than the nomad tribe led by that
patriarch:

Oldest date of Babylon 2300 B.C.
" " Assyria 1500
" " Iran 1500
" " India 1200
" " China 1154
" " Phoenicia 1700
" " Troad 2000
" " Egypt 2760
Sept. date of Deluge 3200

He rejects, of course, the fabulous chronologies of Egypt, China, and
India as mythical, or referring to prehuman and antediluvian periods.
It is to be observed that while these dates place the origins of the
oldest civilized nations at periods considerably subsequent to the
deluge, they do not prevent us from supposing that these nations
commenced their existence wills an advanced civilization borrowed from
antediluvian times, which is indeed a fair conclusion from the
Biblical history, independently of the monumental evidence referred to
by Wallace in a previous paragraph.

The Duke of Argyll, in his excellent little work "Primeval Man," in
which he discusses the arguments in favor of primitive savagery
advanced by Sir J. Lubbock in opposition to the views of Archbishop
Whately in his lecture on the "Origin of Civilization," shows that
there is no necessity to suppose a slow progress of mankind in the
arts extending over indefinite ages; and his argument in this respect
connects itself with the facts as to the high