FOSSIL PEDIGREES 89 



series, from which certain 'laws' and 'principles' have been 

 deduced, he is struck by two facts: that the gaps, in some 

 cases, are enormous as compared with the single changes 

 with which he is familiar, and (what is more important) that 

 they involve numerous parts in many ways. The geneticist 

 says to the palaeontologist, since you do not know, and from 

 the nature of your case can never know, whether your dif- 

 ferences are due to one change or to a thousand, you cannot 

 with certainty tell us anything about the hereditary units 

 which have made the process of evolution possible." {Op. cit, 

 pp. 26, 27.) And without accurate knowledge on this subject, 

 we may add, there is no possibility of demonstrating specific 

 change or genetic relationship in the case of any given fossil. 

 In our discussion of the third defect in the fossil "evidence," 

 allusion was made to a fourth, namely, its imperfect state of 

 preservation. The stone record of bygone days has been so 

 defaced by the metamorphism of rocks, by the solvent action 

 of percolating waters, by erosion, weathering and other factors 

 of destruction, that, like a faded manuscript, it becomes, even 

 apart from its actual lacunae, exceedingly difficult to decipher. 

 So unsatisfactory, indeed, is the condition of the partially ob- 

 literated facts that human curiosity, piqued at their baffling 

 ambiguity, calls upon human imagination to supply what ob- 

 servation itself fails to reveal. Nor does the invitation remain 

 unheeded. Romance hastens to the rescue of uncertain Sci- 

 ence, with an impressive display of "reconstructed fossils," 

 and the hesitation of critical caution is superseded by the 

 dogmatism of arbitrary assumption. Scattered fragments of 

 fossilized bones are integrated into skeletons and clothed by 

 the magic of creative fancy with an appropriate musculature 

 and flesh, reenacting for us the marvelous vision of Ezekiel: 

 "And the bones came together, each one to its joint. And I 

 beheld and, lo, there were sinews upon them, and the flesh 

 came upon them: and the skin was stretched over them." 

 (Chap. XXXVII, 7, 8.) "It is also true," says Osborn (who, 

 like Haeckel, evinces a veritable mania for "retouching" in- 



