ge how far the problem of the origin of
races may be capable of exact solution; but the experience gained since
1871 countenances Darwin's prophecy that before long the dispute between
the monogenists and the polygenists would die a silent and unobserved
death.

IV. _Antiquity of Man._--Until the 10th century man's first appearance
on earth was treated on a historical basis as matter of record. It is
true that the schemes drawn up by chronologists differed widely, as was
natural, considering the variety and inconsistency of their documentary
data. On the whole, the scheme of Archbishop Usher, who computed that
the earth and man were created in 4004 B.C., was the most popular (see
CHRONOLOGY). It is no longer necessary, however, to discuss these
chronologies. Geology has made it manifest that our earth must have been
the seat of vegetable and animal life for an immense period of time;
while the first appearance of man, though comparatively recent, is
positively so remote, that an estimate between twenty and a hundred
thousand years may fairly be taken as a minimum. This geological claim
for a vast antiquity of the human race is supported by the similar
claims of prehistoric archaeology and the science of culture, the
evidence of all three departments of inquiry being intimately connected,
and in perfect harmony.

Human bones and objects of human manufacture have been found in such
geological relation to the remains of fossil species of elephant,
rhinoceros, hyena, bear, &c., as to lead to the distinct inference that
man already existed at a remote period in localities where these
mammalia are now and have long been extinct. The not quite conclusive
researches of Tournal and Christol in limestone caverns of the south of
France date back to 1828. About the same time P.C. Schmerling of Liege
was exploring the ossiferous caverns of the valley of the Meuse, and
satisfied himself that the men whose bones he found beneath the
stalagmite floors, together with bones cut and flints shaped by human
workmanship, had inhabited this Belgian district at the same time with
the cave-bear and several other extinct animals whose bones were
imbedded with them (_Recherches sur les ossements fossiles decouverts
dans les cavernes de la province de Liege_ (Liege, 1833-1834)). This
evidence, however, met with little acceptance among scientific men. Nor,
at first, was more credit given to the discovery by M. Boucher de
Perthes, about 1841, of r