Review of the evidence relating to auriferous gravel man in California / by William H. Holmes.

  • Holmes, William Henry, 1846-1933.
Date:
1901
Catalogue details

Licence: In copyright

Credit: Review of the evidence relating to auriferous gravel man in California / by William H. Holmes. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    Whitney’s researches and conclusions. Professor IVhitney found that the gold-bearing gravel deposits were, in the main, very old; that their formation began at least in Middle Tertiary time and continued down to the end of the Plioeene period, and, in fact, in varjdng degree down to the present time. Examining the evidence with the utmost care, he found it impossible to avoid the conclusion that man} of the relics of man and his arts came from those portions of ^the gravels that could with reasonable certainty be assigned to the Pliocene; that these finds were associated with the remains of extinct species of animals and plants; that they represented a race of ordinary physical characters, though having a culture of the lowest range compatible with the human status. He pointed out that a prominent feature of the evidence was its coherency; coming from a multitude of independent sources and from widely dis- tributed localities, it all pointed in one direction. There was no sug- gestion of the manufacture of evidence and no apparent motive for deception. The observations were all those of miners, but a ‘‘long chain of circumstantial evidence is frequently more convincing than a single statement of an [expert] eyewitness.”^ Since Whitney’s time the evidence has been strengthened by Becker, and especially by his statement that Mr. Clarence King, director of the Survey of the For- tieth Parallel, found part of a stone pestle in the firmly compacted tufaceous deposits under the lava cap of Tuolumne table mountain and removed it from the matrix with his own hands. It is impossible not to be deeply impressed by the amount and con- sistent nature of the evidence presented; }^et such is the magnitude of the proposition to be sustained that even this testimony seems inade- quate, and we seek by reexamination and renewed research to deter- mine its exact strength and true significance. AGE OF THE AURIFEROUS GRAVELS. The substantial correctness of the geologic determinations of Whit- ney has recently been made fully apparent by researches of the able geologists of the United States Geological Survey. It was expected by many students of the subject that the relic-bearing gravels would in time prove to be younger than Whitney believed; that they would be found to correspond in age with the Glacial period—possibly with the closing episodes of that period as determined in the Eastern States—and others were confident that they would prove to be even post-Glacial; but instead of this, Becker, Lindgrin, Turner^ and Diller have extended the gravel-forming epoch to cover the Pliocene and probably the greater part of the Eocene, thus making comparisons with the close of the Glacial period hardly more reasonable than the attempt to include the whole group of phenomena within the period of Biblical record.