वेदों की प्राचीनता एवं काल-निर्णय / ओरायन (लोकमान्य बाल गंगाधर तिलक - खगोलीय वैदिक शोध)

14 . THE ARCTIC HOME IN THE VEDAS. elapsed since the close of the last Glacial period. This estimate agrees very well with the approximate date of the Neolithic period ascertained from the amount of silt in some of the lakes in Switzerland. But it differs materially from the estimate of the European geologists. It is difficult to decide, in the present state of our knowledge, which of these estimates is correct. Probably the Glacial and the Post-Glacial period may not, owing to local causes, have commenced or ended at one and the same time in different places, just as the ages of Stone and Bronze were not synchronous in different countries. Prof. Geikie does not accept the American estimate on the ground that it is inconsistent with the high antiquity of the Egyptian civilisation, as ascertained by recent researches. But if no traces of glaciation are yet found in Africa this objection loses its force, while the arguments by which the American view is supported remain uncontradicted. There are other reasons which go to support the same view. All the evidence regarding the existence of the Glacial period comes form the North of Europe and America; but no traces of glaciation have been yet discovered in the Northern Asia or North Alaska. It is not to be supposed, however, that the northern part of Asia did not enjoy a genial climate in early times. As observed by Prof. Geikie "everywhere throughout this vast region alluvial deposits are found packed up with the remains of mammoth, woolly rhinoceros, bison, and horse;" and "the fossils are usually so well preserved that on one occasion the actual carcass of a mammoth was exposed in so fresh a state that dogs ate the flesh thereof." * These and other equally indisputable facts clearly indicate the existence in Siberia of a mild and genial climate at a time, which, from the freshness of the fossil remains, cannot be supposed to be removed from the present by several *. See Geikie's Great Ice Age, 1st Ed., p. 495; Dr. Croll's Climate and Cosmology, p. 179.