October, 1928 



LVOLUTION 



Page Nine 



Twigs From the Family Tree 



By N. K. McKechnie 



Prologue 

 At the very summit oj a pass in the Andes the traveler crosses a little stream, which 

 if followed in its downward course he will find presently to be divided by a great rock 

 bastion, so that one branch falls aivay to the eastward and eventually becomes part of 

 a tributary of the Amazon, while the other turns to the west and joins a river that dis- 

 charges into the Pacific. So a couple of tivigs from the same tree throivn into the stream 

 at its fountainhead may end their voyage to salt water with the breadth oj a continent 

 between them. 



THE STORY 

 TW'ANY hundreds of thousands of years 

 ago, — so many that the exact num- 

 ber does not matter, — the long earth- 

 wrinkle that now runs across Europe and 

 Asia under the names of the Pyrenees, 

 Alps, Carpathians, Caucasus and Himalaya 

 mountains did not exist, and a semi-tropi- 

 cal forest stretched to the Pole itself. 



Within the forest and on the great open 

 spaces it enclosed, lived a multitude of 

 creatures; some suggesting badly-drawn 

 caricatures of animals familiar to us to- 

 day, others totally unlike anything now 

 living. Of flesh-eaters there were very 

 very few; it was from herbs and trees that 

 the animals obtained' their sustenance. But 

 the most striking feature by which the 

 inhabitants of the earth in those days dif- 

 fered from our own was that search the 

 round world over you would find never 

 a man, nor anything so nearly resembling 

 him as even a monkey. The remote an- 

 cestor from which the primates were to 

 come was a little squirrel-like creature 

 bursting with life and energy which led 

 an intoxicating existence on the roof of 

 the forest, — an ethereal country suspended 

 between the earth and the sky; a swaying 

 floor of creepers and interwoven foliage, 

 laden with a mold of decayed leaves, moss 

 and rotting wood, watered by thunder- 

 storms, and manured by seed.bearing 

 birds; with grasses growing and great 

 fields of weeds shaded by the tops of the 

 higher trees, perfumed by the great flowers 

 of the parasitical creepers, and steaming 

 with heat. 



Here the ancestors of all men now liv- 

 ing lived a joyous, carefree life for hun- 

 dreds of thousands of years. 



Then the moimtains rose, and, cut off 

 from the warm moist breezes of the south- 

 ern ocean, the districts to the north changed 

 in character. Gradually, very gradually, 

 the vast luxuriant forests dwindled to scat- 

 tered wood-lands clinging to moist situa- 

 tions; and from this by regional transi- 

 tions to the vast prairies of the central 

 European and Asiatic plains or the arid 

 deserts of Tibet. 



It was in the first stage of this chang- 

 ing environment that man was born, and 

 the exigencies of our story demand we 

 should view a typical case at close range. 



Some millions of years ago on the north- 

 ern slopes of a mountain range a troop 

 of little animals are scampering across 

 some open ground between two groves of 

 trees. In the lead is the male, the Daddy 

 o.'' the band. He is about the size of an 



Irish terrier, — for our ancestors have 

 gro-.vn considerably since our former 

 glimpse of them — , and runs on all-fours 

 in a clumsy fashion of his own. He 

 doesn"t like the solid ground and is much 

 more at home in the trees, but what are 

 you to do when you have exhausted the 

 supplies in one feeding-place? You must 

 naturally move on to the next. And it is 

 well to move quickly because the ground 

 is by no means so safe as in days of 

 yore, — when one did not need to use it. 



The flesh-eaters have come! 



Not so numerous as they were yet to 

 be, but suiHcient to exercise a far-spread 

 influence on their fellow-creatures. 



Of these those that shrank from battle 

 adopted various means to escape the Kill- 

 ers. Some took to the water and became 

 seals or whales, some to the air like the 

 hats, some burrowed into the ground like 

 the rabbits and conies, and some like the 

 little ancestors of the horse and deer culti- 

 vated the gift of speed. 



What will man's ancestors do, bereft as 

 they are of the forests that were their 

 natural refuge from all enemies? Hard 

 times ahead, Daddy! But if it is any 

 consolation to you (and of course it isn't), 

 let us state that not only to but out of 

 trouble man is bom. 



Behind the old troop-leader are his 

 harem and a miscellaneous swarm of his 

 descendants, — at least most of them are 

 his descendants. Of these the older of 

 the young males keep a respectful dis- 

 tance from their formidable parent be- 

 cause there has been one of the constantly 

 recurring family flare-ups that always oc- 

 cur when Daddy notices any of his sons 

 taking an undue interest in the females 

 of the band. That is the one thing that 

 the old fellow will not tolerate. All deal- 

 ings with the opposite sex are for him 

 and him alone. And each year sees a 

 certain number of half-grown males driven 

 out from the family fellowship carrj'ing on 

 their persons the marks of their father's 

 teeth. No such heresy as the rights of 



the younger generation can raise its head 

 in these days! 



Daddy reaches the fig-tree that was his 

 objective and in a moment has swung 

 himself upon a branch laden with the 

 luscious fruit. Chattering volubly the 

 band follows him, the tiny babies clinging 

 fast to their mother's fur, and soon all are 

 happy, fingers and jaws fully occupied. 



Hunger appeased, their irrepressible 

 spirits as usual find vent in play, and the 

 tree is alive with their little furry forms, 

 scampering along the branches in pursuit 

 one of another, swinging from bough tO' 

 bough, squealing with delight. 



But suddenly there is an angry bark 

 and Daddy comes hurtling through the 

 air towards a young male he has detected 

 in suspicious dallying with a lady. The 

 culprit just saves himself by a lightning 

 spring to another bough. Daddy is hard 

 after him, bent on avenging this renewed 

 outrage to his most sacred feelings. But, 

 alas, advancing years have somewhat di- 

 minished his agility, and the active young- 

 ster keeps well ahead as they fly from 

 branch to branch and tree to tree. At 

 last the irate parent abandons the chase 

 and returns in a very bad temper to where 

 he has left his flock, pounces unexpectedly 

 on another of his sons who is quite in- 

 nocently pawing at a comrade swinging 

 from loop of liana, and makes his teeth 

 meet in his shoulder. There is a terrific 

 squeal, repeated again and again as the 

 old boy renews his attack, and this young 

 one is given chase to and driven far 

 away to join his companion in exile . 



Then still grumbling, and with the re- 

 mainder of the males keeping at a wide 

 distance from his vicinity, the ruffled au- 

 tocrat seeks the soothing society of the 

 gentler sex. 



And so it happened tliat when the next 

 day a forest fire, kindled by a volcanic 

 out-break (of which there were many in 

 those days), came sweeping up the moun- 

 tain side, the two young Jnales, still 

 separated from the rest of the party, were 

 cut off from following them in their up- 

 ward flight and barely avoided roasting 

 by the lucky chance of a deep water- 

 course that enabled them to escape with 

 nothing more serious than some singed fur. 



The band from which they were thus 

 severed continued its panic-stricken flight 

 before the devouring flames until a spot 

 was reached where rocks and stunted 

 shrubs gave check to their enemy. They 

 entered a wide valley, which though they 

 knew it not was a pass leading to the 

 other side of the range, and here they 

 wandered for two or three years, always 

 moving forward because food was scarce, 

 until at last they came to the southern 

 end of the pass and a billowing sea of 

 foliage lay below them stretching as far 

 as the eye could see. — and thousands of 

 miles further. 



They had found the lost Paradise of 

 iheir remote ancestors! 



Let us leave them to the enjoyment of 

 it and return to the two derelicts behind 

 in the bumt-out wilderness. 



(Continued in next issue) 



