near Lansing, Kansas; and other instances indicating that man was here at a very early period.

The archaeologist, however, was not permitted to monopolize those precious antiquities to bolster up his preconceived theories. The astute geologist intrusively applied the tests of his science, and proved conclusively that the water-worn matrix imbedding those relics was in no instance near so old as the relic-hunters claimed them to be. And the craniologist demonstrated the fact that the human skulls were of the same round (brachycephalic) type and developement as those of modern Indians; and, further, that the associated stone implements, etc., were of the neolithic era, and decidedly recent.

The latest of the earth's great catastrophes, the Glacial Period, occurred long ago. Yet, science presumes to determine its date, approximately, by our present chronological scale. Geikie says: "Upwards of 200,000 years ago the earth, as we know from the calculations of astronomers, was so placed in regard to the sun that a series of physical changes was induced, which eventually resulted in conferring upon our hemisphere a most intensely severe climate. All northern Europe and northern America disappeared beneath a thick crust of ice and snow, and the glaciers of such regions as Switzerland assumed gigantic proportions."" And the glacial epoch, according to Croll, extended here over a period of 80,000 years.*

The American ice sheet-perhaps a mile or more in thickness over the area of our great northern lakes-covered Illinois, excepting a small northwestern corner, as far down as Jonesboro and Shawneetown, receding for awhile, then again advancing, and finally very slowly disappeared by melting away. The valley of the St.

3 The Great Ice Age. James Gelkie, F. R. S. E., F. G. S., New York. D. Appleton & Co., 1874, p. 469.

4 Climate And Time. By James Croll, Geologist of Scotland. New York, 1874. D. Appleton & Co., p. 328.

Lawrence, as far up as Lake Erie, remained filled with ice long after the water-sheds farther west were freed from their gradually retreating glaciation. Consequently, the waters of Lake Michigan rose to the height of the old Chicago beach lines, and then escaped, in great volume, through the valley of the Illinois river. In course of time the St. Lawrence ice barrier was removed, thereby restoring the eastern outlet of the Lakes, lowering Lake Michigan to its present level, and relieving the Illinois river valley of its immense enforced drainage.

For many centuries during and after the Ice Age, Illinois was a barren desolation in which terrestrial life was impossible. The great pachyderms, the mastodons and mammoths, that for ages had held undisputed sway over forest and plain, together with the entire primal fauna and flora, were swept away and buried in the mass of detritus left by the departed ice, commensurate in extent with the ice-covered area. That crushed, ground, water-worn material-classified by geologists as "mantle rock," "boulder clay, or till," and "glacial drift, or loess"-deposited from 1 to 450 feet in thickness, wrought vast changes in the physiography of our State by filling river beds and valleys, diverting streams in other courses, and giving the average surface its present topographical flatness." Within ten or twelve hundred centuries following the last recession of the ice fields, the process of transforming Illinois from a lifeless solitude to a theatre of teeming animation, by the agencies of rain and frost, wind and sunshine, was slowly accomplished. Life, both animal and vegetable, first appeared in the rivers and lakes. Vegetation cautiously creeping landward, spread, flourished, and, by succession of growth and decay for ages coated the drift sands and clays with productive soil.

See the very interesting and instructive monograph by Prof. Harlan H. Barrows; entitled, "Geography of the Middle Illinois Valley," published as Bulletin 15 of the Illinois State Geological Survey.

The Indian was the first human being to implant his footsteps upon that soil in Illinois. The fact that the primitive aborigines left no written records, and that we are totally ignorant of their origin, language and traditions, suggests the wisdom of formulating conclusions concerning them with the utmost care. We know they were Indians by the physical and biological evidence of their anatomical remains. And, although the analist's scale of years and centuries can not reliably be applied to the measure of cosmic time, it can be asserted with some degree of confidence that the first Indians arrived here less than 2,000 years ago. Meeting no one to contest their possession of the country, they occupied it peacefully. Atmospheric and climatic conditions were the same then as now, and the ecology of plant and animal life but little different. The forces of rains, winds, here and aggradations there, as still in action, had frost and water currents-causing erosions and abrasions, shaped the surface of Illinois and had given expression and charm to its varied landscapes.

No positive evidence of the existence of a Paleolithic age in Illinois has yet been discovered. In all parts of the State ample opportunities have been afforded scientists for exhaustive examination of its mantle rock, till, loess and moraine deposits in their bisections by postglacial streams, by their exposure in numerous railroad cuts, in deep borings, well-digging and other excavations, without, thus far, bringing to light any object that could certainly be identified as a pre-glacial or inter-glacial paleolith of artificial shaping; or other proof of an extinct human race prior to the Indians.

The rudely chipped flints represented in Plate 1, found, with others, in the glacial gravels of the old lake beaches at Chicago some years ago, and widely proclaimed to be implements of a pre-Indian, pre-glacial, people, were carefully examined, with their surroundings, by competent archaelogists who, observing they were there