366 SEXUAL SELECTION: MAN. [Part II 



natural selection combined with the inherited effects of 

 habit, for the most able men will have succeeded best in 

 defending and providing for themselves, their wives and 

 offspring. As far as the extreme intricacy of the subject 

 permits us to judge, it appears that our male ape-like pro- 

 genitors acquired their beards as an ornament to charm or 

 excite the opposite sex, and transmitted them to man as 

 he now exists. The females apparently were first de- 

 nuded of hair in like manner as a sexual ornament ; but 

 they transmitted this character almost equally to both 

 sexes. It is not improbable that the females were modi- 

 fied in other respects for the same purpose and through 

 the same means ; so that women have acquired sweeter 

 voices and become more beautiful than men. 



It deserves particular attention that with mankind all 

 the conditions, for sexual selection were much more favor- 

 able, during a very early period, when man had only just 

 attained to the rank of manhood, than during later times. 

 For he would then, as we may safely conclude, have been 

 guided more by his instinctive passions, and less by fore- 

 sight or reason. He would not then have been so utterly 

 licentious as many savages now are; and each male would 

 have jealously guarded his wife or wives. He would not 

 then have practised infanticide ; nor valued his wives 

 merely as useful slaves ; nor have been betrothed to them 

 during infancy. Hence we may infer that the races of 

 men were differentiated, as far as sexual selection is con- 

 cerned, in chief part during a very remote epoch ; and 

 this conclusion throws light on the remarkable fact that 

 at the most ancient period, of which we have as yet ob- 

 tained any record, the races of man had" already come to 

 differ nearly or quite as much as they do at the present 

 day. 



The views here advanced, on the part which sexual 

 selection has played in the history of man, want scien- 



