July, 1929 



E\-OLUTION 



Page Seven 



long, scrapers were retouched only on one side, the 

 other being used for holding. Sometimes they were 

 made into a sort of axe, both edges being chipped. 

 but only on one surface. These may also have been 

 hafted for a handle. 



Crude, improvised bone tools, usually from the 

 lower leg, were probably used for skinning and pre- 

 paring the hides of animals. As bone is so perishable, 

 we cannot be sure whether Neanderthal man used them 

 more than stone for tools, but from the crudeness of 

 the bone tools, we conclude that they were improvised 

 and used only a few times before being discarded. 



The experts agree that this race, once so widely pre- 

 valent, became extinct and left no descendants. Their 

 place seem.s to have been taken quite suddenly by a 

 new race called the Cro-Magnon, thought to have im- 

 migrated from Asia. 



This is third of four articles by Mr, Cleiiinier on The .\jieestors 

 of Modem Man, the next being on The Cro-Magnon People. 



The Earliest Bird 



{Continued from Page 5) 



that it is necessary to place them apart from other 

 animals in a separate division of the class birds. 



Archaeopteryx was considerably smaller than a 

 crow, with a stout little head armed with sharp teeth 

 (as scarce as hen's teeth was no joke in that distant 

 period), while as he fluttered through the air he trailed 

 after him a tail longer than his body, beset with 

 feathers on either side. Everyone knows that now- 

 adays the feathers of a bird's tail are arranged like the 

 sticks of a fan, and that the tail opens and shuts like 

 a fan. But in Archaeopteryx the feathers were ar- 

 ranged in pairs, a feather on each side of every joint 



Earliest Known Bird, Archeopterix. Impressed on Sand- 

 stone Slab 



of the tail, so that on a small scale the tail was some- 

 thing like that of a kite ; and because of this long, 

 lizard-like tail this bird and his immediate kin are 

 placed in a group dubbed Saururae, or lizard-tailed. 

 Because impressions of feathers are not found all 

 around these specimens some have thought that they 

 were confined to certain portions of the body — the 



wings, tail and thighs — the other parts being naked. 

 There seems, however, no good reason to suppose that 

 such was the case, for it is extremely improbable that 

 such perfect and important feathers as those of the 

 wings and tail should alone have been developed, while 

 there are many reasons why the feathers of the body 

 might have been lost before the bird was covered by 

 mud, or why the impressions do not show. 



It was a considerable time after the finding of the 

 first speciment that the presence of teeth in the jaws 

 was discovered, partly because the British Museum 

 specimen was imperfect (the skull was lacking, and a 

 part of the upper jaw lying to one side was thought to 

 belong to a fish), and partly because no one suspected 

 that birds had ever possessed teeth, and so no one ever 

 looked for them. When, in 1877, a more complete 

 example was found, the existence of teeth was un- 

 mistakably shown; but in the meantime, in February, 

 1873, Professor Marsh had announced the presence 

 of teeth in the diving bird Hesperornis, so to him be- 

 longs the credit of discovering birds with teeth. 



The first discovered specimen of Archaeopteryx is 

 in the British Museum, the second and more complete 

 example is in the Royal Museum of Natural History, 

 Berlin, and is here shown on its stone slab. 



AMPHIOXUS 



(A song to be sung with the well-known chorus) 



Tune: "Tipperary." 

 I 

 .\ fish-like thing appeared among the annelids one day. 

 It hadn't any parapods or setae to display. 

 If hadn't any eyes or jaws, or ventral nervous cord. 

 But it had a lot of gill-slits and it had a notochord. 



Chorus 

 It's a long way from Amphioxus, it's a long way to us, 

 It's a long way from Amphioxus to the meanest human cuss. 

 Good-bye fins and gill-slits! Welcome lungs and hair! 

 It's a long way froin Amphioxus, but we came from there. 



II 



It wasn't much to look at, and it scarce knew how to swim, 

 And Nereis was very sure it didn't come from him. 

 The Molluscs w^ouldn't own it and the Arthropods got sore, 

 So the poor thing had to burrow in the sand along the shore. 

 Chorus 



III 



It wriggled in the sand before a crab could nip its tail. 

 It said "Gill-slits and myotomes are all of no avail. 

 I've grown some metapleural folds, and sport an oral hood, 

 But all these fine new characters don't do me any good." 

 Chorus 



IV 

 It sulked awhile down in the sand without a bit of pep. 

 Then stiffened up its notochord and said, "I'll beat 'em yet. 

 I've got more possibilities within my slender frame 

 Than all these proud Invertebrates that treat me with such 

 shame. " Chorus 



V 

 "My notochord shall grow into a chain of vertebrae: 

 As fins, my metapleural folds shall agitate the sea. 

 This tiny dorsal nervous tube shall form a nn'ghty brain, 

 And the vertebrates shall dominate the animal domain." 

 Chorus 



Philip H. Pope. 



