m, seems to have at that stage exhausted its energies. This is
but an illustration of the fact that a race, like an individual, has a
period of growth, a maturity of healthful powers, and an old age of slow
decadence. After thus dispersing over the world, carrying with them
the culture of the Neolithic Age, they seem to have halted in their
progress. It remained for a new people, starting, perhaps, from the same
state of culture, but with new energies, to discover and employ metals
in the construction of tools and implements. This gave them so great
a command over nature that civilization became possible. But whatever
considerable advance the Turanian races were able to make beyond the
Neolithic culture was by reason of intercourse with these later people.
Where completely isolated from them, as in the New World, they remained,
for the most part, in the Neolithic culture.<48>

We have hitherto spoken as if there was but one race in Europe during
Neolithic times. In the main this is true; yet, near the close of this
time, a different race arrived in Europe. That this is so, is proved
by the same line of evidence used to determine the Neolithic people. We
shall have much to say of them hereafter. They were the vanguard of the
great Aryan race. This calls for some explanation. It has been found
that the principal languages of Europe and South-western Asia have
certain common characteristics; so much so that we are justified, even
compelled, to assume that the nations speaking these languages, such for
instance as the Teutonic, Sclavic, Italic, Greek, Persian, Hindoostanee,
and others, are descendants from a common ancestor. These people are
called, collectively, Aryans. They were the ones who drove the Turanians
out of the fairest portions of Europe. Though they appeared at a late
date, they have filled the most important places in history, and the
civilization of the world to-day is Aryan.

Now we must again form a mental picture of Neolithic Europe--after it
had been for a long time in the possession of the Turanian tribes,
the first band of Aryan invaders make their appearance. They must have
appeared somewhere near the south-eastern confines of Europe, but they
pressed forward to the western portion. They firmly seated themselves in
the western and central parts of Europe, driving out the Turanian tribes
who had so long possessed the land. They were themselves still in the
Neolithic stage of culture. But they probably