670 THE LAST STEPS IN THE GENEALOGY OF MAN. 



I.— LEMURS. 



The lemurs have been classeil among the quadrumana by Geoffroy 

 Saint Hihiire, Cuvier, de Blainville, Diiveruoy, and Milne Edwards, 

 and among" the primates by Linnaeus, Lesson, Huxley, and Broca; that is 

 to say, separated from man in the first case and re-united to him in the 

 second. Vogt and Haeckel give them the name of pro-simians. The 

 Germans call them half-apes (Halbaffen) 5 the French sometimes the 

 false-apes. The main question is, to what extent are they apes? Do 

 they merit the name of x>ro-simiaus, and should they figure among the 

 primates? 



What do we understand by the primates ? The best definition seems 

 to be the following : The primates are non-aquatic, placental mammals 

 (which excludes the cetacea, sirenia, and pinnipeds); they have no 

 hoofs (which excludes the ungulata and proboscidea) ; they have three 

 kinds of teeth (which sets aside the rodentia and edeutata), and their 

 molars are not in sharp and cutting ridges, or with sharp and conical 

 points (which excludes the caruivora and insectivora). 



But have they not certain characters in common ? Not absolutely. 

 Naturalists omit in their scheme of characters the type of cerebral con- 

 volutions. The primates have a discoidal placenta, a uterus with a 

 cavity not two-horned, and the penis pendant. 



Passing over the first two characters, the third is observed likewise 

 in the cheiroptera or bats. The primates have two pectoral mammae, 

 but so have the cheiroptera and sirenia. 



The teeth that everywhere furnish characters of the first order, vary 

 as to number, form, and degree of continuity : all we are able to say 

 here is that they are much more specialized, much closer together, and 

 are above all, much more fixed in their general formula, as the families 

 rise toward num. 



Under the last head there are four stages : the lemurs, the monkeys 

 of the old world, the monkeys of the new world, and man. 



The nails, which among the primates take the place of claws, are one 

 of their most important characteristics. So long as the claws are horny 

 productions, compressed transversely, more or less long, recurved and 

 sharp pointed, they serve as organs of attack and defense ; and in the 

 hoof the homy growth curves in on every side and envelops the digi- 

 tal extremity to hinder direct contact w ith the ground, and adapt it 

 exclusively to walking. The nails are horny growths flattened above 

 and below, growing straight and serving to facilitate prehension and 

 toucli. Their adaptation to that use is more or less perfect and applies 

 more or less to the fingers of the primates; this allows us again to 

 divide them into perfect primates, such as man and the monkeys 

 (minus a certain group), and the imperfect primates. 



The well developed thumb, separated from the other fingers and 

 opposable, is a cliaracter of adaptation, the corollary of the nails. More 

 completely, it is besides an organ for clamping, for seizing, and for 



