448 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



simply a grasping apparatus related to tree life. With him its 

 operations are associated with those of touch, sight, and the mus- 

 cular sense, and it becomes the faithful executant of the orders of 

 the brain. Is there anything more wonderful than the move- 

 ment imperceptibly and gradually impressed by the fingers on the 

 screw of the microscope in micrometrical operations ? The hand, 

 therefore, relates the anthropoid to man, but more in appearance 

 than in reality, for in the anthropoid it still remains the brutal 

 grasping apparatus of the monkeys. 



The last characteristic is that of attitude. It is complex in the 

 monkeys, similar in some respects to that of quadrupeds generally, 

 but really special. Signs of the erection of the trunk are already 

 manifested in some monkeys — as, for instance, the cynocephalus. 

 This erection is emphasized in the anthropoids, but without reach- 

 ing the upright position, and really permitting standing on the 

 feet. With them the characteristics leading to that attitude bear 

 on little else than the viscera and the vertebral column. They 

 are inappreciable in the head, and are hardly more marked in the 

 lower limbs, where the calves, thighs, and buttocks, character- 

 istic of the effort necessary for keeping the upright position, are 

 wanting. 



Contrary to what has been said, the anthropoids are less quali- 

 fied to hold themselves erect than the other monkeys. These can 

 walk on the ground with extended sole ; the anthropoids are less 

 able to do so. The monkeys had in the lower as well as in the 

 upper limbs a hand competent to act as a foot. This hand is im- 

 proved in the anthropoids in the direction of its function of grasp- 

 ing, but to the detriment of its accessory function as a foot ; in the 

 lower limbs it is turned in in such a way that the palm can grasp 

 a tree by the side, but can only painfully set itself on the ground 

 upon its outer edge, and very likely, too, upon the backs of the 

 toes. The hinder hand, therefore, hollows out a gulf between 

 the anthropoids and the monkey ; but the gulf between man and 

 the anthropoids is wider. 



Cuvier's reasoning was correct. The monkeys, and still more 

 the anthropoids, deserve the name of quadrumana on condition 

 that we do not understand the word hand in the rigorous sense 

 that is given it in the case of man, but in the sense of an instru- 

 ment that adapts itself to some kind of prehension. To us man 

 alone has two real hands, as he alone among the Primates has 

 two feet capable of supporting the entire weight of the body 

 standing. When we suppose that the anthropoid is in a stage of 

 advance toward a vertical position, we confound in him charac- 

 teristics relative to the adaptation of the arm and forearm to the 

 prehensile function and characteristics relative to the vertical at- 

 titude. If we suppress the former and whatever bears upon the 



