984 OF THE BRANCHES OF THE HUMAN FAMILY. 



as yet been deciphered; whilst even under the most favorable circumstance?, 

 and with the largest amount of information that can be obtained from this 

 source, it is certain that the softness of the tissues of many animals will have 

 presented an effectual obstacle to their preservation. 1 It is obvious that if 

 this mode of explanation of the production of species be extended to its 

 utmost limits, we may reach the extreme of simplicity; for it may well be 

 said, that if a few types only are needed, these may again be reduced in 

 number to a greater and still greater degree, until at length we arrive at 

 that which is common to all at some stage of their existence the single 

 nucleated cell a structure which comprehends the totality of the life of 

 some animals and vegetables, and is constantly met with as the earliest stage 

 of development of all; whilst the whole superstructure of both kingdoms 

 may be considered to proceed from a gradual process of development and 

 differentiation of this primary and most simple organization. It is but just 

 to remark, however, that Prof. Owen, one of the best authorities on this 

 subject, has in a recently published work advanced a different explanation 

 of the origin of species. He states 2 that, " being unable to accept the vo- 

 litional hypothesis, or that of impulse from within, or the selective force 

 exerted by outward circumstances," he deems " that a minute tendency to 

 deviate from parental type operating through periods of adequate duration 

 is the most probable nature, or way of operation, of the secondary law, 

 whereby species have been derived one from the other." 



822. By those who embrace the developmental theory, numerous facts 

 have been recently collected, tending in the first place to prove that Man 

 has existed for many thousands of years upon the face of the earth ; and 

 secondly, that the more remote the period at which he can be proved to 

 have existed, the ruder, more savage and degraded, both in a social and a 

 structural or physical point of view, was his condition. In regard to the 

 former point, very strong evidence has recently been obtained by the dis- 

 covery of Human remains intermingled with those of extinct animals, as 

 the Mammoth, Cave Bear, and woolly Rhinoceros, in the breccias of various 

 caverns, as in those of Liege and Eugis ; whilst in other instances where no 

 bones have been discovered, perhaps in consequence of the practice of burn- 

 ing the dead, almost equally unexceptional evidence has been obtained from 

 the discovery of works of art fashioned by Human hands, as in the flint im- 

 plements found buried in the drift at Abbeville in Picardy and at St. Acheul 

 near Amiens, and those found at- Hoxne in Suffolk, and in Brixham Cave 

 near Torquay. 3 In these instances the geological position of the remains, as 

 well as the circumstance of their being accompanied by the bones of so many 



1 The occurrence of a few cases where the conditions have been favorable, as in the 

 instance of the Tellian of the Freshwater Chalk Formation of Steinheim mentioned 

 by Oscar Schmidt (in his Descendenzlehre, 1873, p. 87), is highly suggestive in this 

 point of view. Here the deposit from a small inland lake may be divided into about 

 forty petrographically distinguishable layers, and throughout the whole scries the 

 varieties of Planorbis multiformis are distributed in such a manner that individual 

 layers are characterized as successive strata by the exclusive occurrence, or by the 

 predominance of one or morn varieties, which within the layer remain constant or 

 ^lightly variable, but towards the limits of the next layer lead by transition to the 

 succeeding forms. The forms diverge so greatly, and are so constant in the main 

 zones, that in accordance with the old conchological practice they would be un- 

 re-eryeilly claimed as species, if the connecting links were not too conspicuous and 

 the territory too circumscribed, and if the geological period which must, however, 

 !' reckunrd by thousands of years were nut. considered too insignificant. Similar 

 ,M:itenieiit.s may be made in respect to the Ammonites. 



2 Cornp. An'at. and Physiol. of Vertebrates, I860, p. 807. 



3 For full information respecting wbich, see the Antiquity of Man, by Sir Charles 

 Lyell, 1863. 



