Page:Early Man in Britain and His Place in the Tertiary Period.djvu/245

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CHAP. VII.]
HUNTING.
217

bulk could not be carried. The portions carried off would be cut away from the larger bones. We can picture to ourselves the camp round the carcases, and the fires kindled not merely to cook the flesh, but to keep away beasts of prey attracted by the scent of blood. The tribe assembled round, and the dark trunks of the oaks or Scotch firs lighted up by the blaze, with hyænas lurking in the background, are worthy of the brush of a future Rembrandt. No dogs were used in the chase, and there is no trace of any other domestic animal.

Fig. 82.—Seal incised on Canine of Bear, Duruthy Cave, 1/1.

The Cave-men depended mainly for their sustenance on the supply of reindeer and the other animals mentioned above; but when they had an opportunity they attacked the animals living in the sea. In the cave of Duruthy, explored by MM. Louis Lartet and Chaplain Duparc, near Sorde, in the valley of the Gave d'Oloron, in the Western Pyrenees, the figure of a seal is engraved on the canine of a cave-bear, which has been perforated for use as an ornament (Fig. 82), and a rounded fragment of antler from Laugerie Basse carries the outlines of a whale (Fig. 83), either the cachalot or sperm whale (Cetodon macrocephalus), or possibly the black fish