Chap. VI. AFFINITIES AND GENEALOGY. 199 



ever much the conclusion may revolt our pride, that 

 our early progenitors would have been properly thus 

 designated. 15 But we must not fall into the error of 

 supposing that the early progenitor of the whole Simian 

 stock, including man, was identical with, or even closely 

 resembled, any existing ape or monkey. 



On the Birthplace and Antiquity of Man. — We are 

 naturally led to enquire where was the birthplace of 

 man at that stage of descent when our progenitors 

 diverged from the Catarhine stock. The fact that 

 they belonged to this stock clearly shews that they 

 inhabited the Old World ; but not Australia nor any 

 oceanic island, as we may infer from the laws of geogra- 

 phical distribution. In each great region of the world 

 the living mammals are closely related to the extinct 

 species of the same region. It is therefore probable 

 that Africa w r as formerly inhabited by extinct apes 

 closely allied to the gorilla and chimpanzee ; and as 

 these two species are now man's nearest allies, it is 

 somewhat more probable that our early progenitors 

 lived on the African continent than elsewhere. But 

 it is useless to speculate on this subject, for an ape 

 nearly as large as a man, namely the Dryopithecus 

 of Lartet, which was closely allied to the anthropo- 

 morphous Hylobates, existed in Europe during the 

 Upper Miocene period ; and since so remote a period 

 the earth has certainly undergone many great revo- 

 lutions, and there has been ample time for migration 

 on the largest scale. 



15 H'ackel has come to this same conclusion. See ' Ueher die Ent- 

 stehung des Menschengeschlechts,' in Virchow's ' Sammlung. gemein. 

 wissen. Vortrage,' 18G8, s. 61. Also his 'Naturliche Schopfungs- 

 geschichte,' 1868, in which he gives in detail his views on the geuea- 

 logy of man. 



