but that it was born with them. On the strength of these superior qualifications, they waive aside all the struggles of man after truth, in the past, as so many distempered dreams, which are about to be dispelled forever, because they have lit up a few farthing candles. Or, as a Buddhist poet says, "they are like infants born at midnight, who, because they see a sunrise, think there was never a yesterday." Let you and I, Mr. Editor, not be of the number. Let us be assured that some truth has come a good while ago, that it is coming still, in many ways, and will come in broader and rosier flashes in the future, though not to him who ostrich-like buries his head in the sand, or muffles his eyes against any of its illuminations.
| I have the honor to be |
| Your obedient servant, |
| Parke Godwin. |
MOMMSEN'S HISTORY AND THE STONE AGE IN ITALY.
Mr. Editor: In Mommsen's "History of Rome"—one of the greatest intellectual productions of the age—vol. i., p. 30, American edition, occurs the following passage: "Nothing has hitherto been brought to light to warrant the supposition that mankind existed in Italy at a period anterior to the knowledge of agriculture and of the smelting of metals; and, if the human race ever within the bounds of Italy really occupied the level of that primitive stage of culture which we are accustomed to call the savage state, every trace of such a fact has disappeared."
Surprised at such a passage in such a book, I read it repeatedly, to be sure of its meaning. It seems to be plain enough. The statement is unwarranted; and, seeing that it is a negative one, it could hardly have been justifiable at the time it was written—probably twenty years ago. But, however that may be, it is certainly an oversight to retain it in the later editions without explanation.
Traces of early peoples who were savage in the extreme are plenty in many parts of Italy, even in the vicinity of Rome. Primitive stone weapons abound at Ponte Molle, Torre di Quinto, and Acqua Traversa, on the right bank of the Tiber. They are found in Liguria, and everywhere in what was Middle Etruria. Flint weapons of the rudest type are found in the lowermost beds of lava in ancient Latium. The like traces of a savage population are found at Imola, Casalvieri, and Alatri, in the neighborhood of Naples; at Ascoli, near Ancona; on Mount Brandon, in the vicinity of Ascoli, and on an island near Monticelli; in the territory of Borgo Ticino, on the plain of Vercelli-Borgo, and in the turf-pits of Mercurago and San Giovanni; in the region of San Germano, near Pinerolo, between the Tarnaro and Barrido, and on the right bank of the Agogna, in the territory of Briga; and in many other localities.
These relics consist mostly of hatchets and arrow or javelin points of flint and common greenstone. They are of all grades of workmanship, from the most rude to the most polished, and such is the variety in this respect that B. Gastaldi, who has thoroughly studied the specimens, believes that, if the usual division of the Stone Period into the Palæolithic and Neolithic (rough and polished stone) Ages be admissible, these relics would justify a further division of the Neolithic into two ages, according to the grade of workmanship.
Prof. Issel believes the evidence quite sufficient to show that the Ligurians remained stone-using savages, without knowledge of the metals, up to the time of their subjugation by the Celts and Romans.
It is trite to observe that unqualified statements resting wholly on negative support are unsafe. Still the learned continue to make them. This of Mommsen's reminds one of Rénan's archæologico-poetic assumption that the Egyptian civilization had no foreground of preparation. This appears very funny in the light of evolution. Whether the Egyptians were autochthones of the Nile or not, their civilization had a long period of beginnings just as certainly as the Hellenic had; and late discoveries, of what are believed by some of the highest authorities to be flint implements, indicate that Egypt was once inhabited by the rudest of savages. It is not safe to affirm of any spot on earth which has been long enough above water, that it has not been in-
