Читать книгу The Romance of Modern Geology. Describing in simple but exact language the making of the earth with some account of prehistoric animal life онлайн

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Let us for a moment consider with Sir Archibald Geikiessss1 the subsoil beneath cities that have been inhabited for many centuries. In London, for example, when excavations are made for drainage, building, and other purposes, there are sometimes found, many feet below the level of the present streets, mosaic pavements and foundations, together with earthern vessels, bronze implements, ornaments, coins, and other relics of Roman time. Now if we knew nothing from actual authentic history of the existence of such a people as the Romans these discoveries deep beneath the surface of modern London would prove that long before the present streets were built the site of the city was occupied by a civilised race which employed bronze and iron for the useful purposes of life, had a metal coinage, and showed not a little artistic skill in its pottery, glass, and sculpture. But down beneath the rubbish wherein the Roman remains are embedded lie gravels and sands from which rudely fashioned human implements of flint, arrow-heads, hammers, and the like have been obtained. From that we learn that before the Romans came an earlier race had been there which employed weapons and instruments of roughly chipped flint.