334 TYPES OF ANIMAL LIFE 



This consideration leads us to make a few remarks as 

 to the origin of the cetacea. Whales, whether toothed 

 or not toothed, have certainly nothing to do with mer- 

 maids or sirenia. The zeuglodon seems to point to a 

 direct connection between them and the seals, but the 

 cetacean-like structure of that creature's backbone may 

 be merely a resemblance induced by similar habitual 

 needs and no sign of real affinity. 



That the whales, like the mermaids, have descended 

 from some four-legged beasts, is shown by the fact of their 

 possessing the rudiments of hind limbs, just as the rudi- 

 mentary teeth of unborn whalebone whales show that 

 such whales had animals with ordinary teeth for their 

 ancestors, and that their wonderful " baleen " is a com- 

 paratively modern improvement. Wherever they come 

 from they must have been evolved since the deposition 

 of the chalk, as it is incredible that had they existed 

 before that period, none of their remains should have 

 been preserved in the cretacean rocks. The presence of 

 the soosoo and of inia in rivers only, points to the 

 possibility of all the cetacea having descended from 

 river-inhabiting species, while Sir William Flower, who 

 has made the whales his special study, deems it probable 

 that they are descendants of some more or less hog- 

 like creature. There are, indeed, many anatomical 

 points of resemblance between the porpoise and the 

 hog. 



A word may be said in conclusion as to the wonderful 

 brain of the porpoise and other cetaceans. It cannot 

 evidently be a sign of the possession of intellectual 

 faculties beyond those of other brutes. When we recall 

 to mind the fact that the sluggish, torpid manatee has a 

 very simple brain, it seems that the large and richly 



