The specimens consist of several well-known palæolithic types, celts, scrapers, arrow-heads and flakes, only ruder and smaller than those of later periods. They were found at three different localities in the same stratum of gravel, and comply with all the tests by which the genuineness of Quaternary implements is ascertained, such as bulbs of percussion, conchoidal fractures, and above all, intentional chipping in a determinate direction. It is evident that a series of small parallel chips or trimmings, confined often to one side only of the flint, and which have the effect of bringing it into a shape which is known from Quaternary and recent implements to be adapted for human use, imply intelligent design, and could not have been produced by the casual collisions of pebbles rolled down by an impetuous torrent. Thus the annexed plate of an implement from the high level drift on the North Downs, shown by Professor Prestwich to the Anthropological Society, is rude enough, but no one has ever expressed the least doubt of its human origin.
The chipped flints from Puy Courny also afford another very conclusive proof of intelligent design. The gravelly deposit in which they are found contains five different varieties of flints, and of these all that look like human implements are confined to one particular variety, which from its nature is peculiarly adapted for human use. As Quatrefages says, no torrents or other natural causes could have exercised such a discrimination, which could only have been made by an intelligent being, selecting the stones best adapted for his tools and weapons.
UPPER MIOCENE IMPLEMENTS. PUY COURNY.
SCRAPER, OR LANCE-HEAD.
Puy Courny. Upper Miocene (Rames).
(Quatrefages, Races Humaines, p. 95.)
SCRAPER.