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transversely, to the legs—the soles of the feet being brought 
flat together.* Further, the baby can move its toes one by 
one, it can spread its toes out fan-like, it can move each toe 
laterally to make a V between any of them—a movement 
which many an adult cannot accomplish with his fingers—it 
can separate the big toe particularly far from the next—there 
being already a well-marked space between them; it can 
retract the big toe with the last joint bent in the same way as 
an adult can retract his thumb; in fact, it can move the big 
toe just as an adult can his thumb.t 
Now the ability to perform all these varied movements is 
lost as the child grows older, instead of becoming more marked 
as it gains in strength; and just in proportion as the ability 
to move the toes decreases so does the power over the muscles 
of the hand increase. 
If we make enquiry among people in general as to why a 
baby differs so much in structure, intelligence, and habits from 
an adult one receives answers not altogether to the credit of the 
general intellect. ‘‘ Because it is a baby”; “because it must 
have shape and habits of some kind”; “because if it did not 
differ it would not be a baby,” are some of the answers I have 
obtained. Such answers are no explanation at all. 
If, however, the law of earlier inheritance hold good 
among the human race as among Ammonites—and if it does in 
the latter it must in the former—the explanation of the baby’s 
difference in structure, habits, etc., are, as in the case of 
the infantile Ammonite: the various phases of babyhood are 
approximately the morphological representations of various 
adult ancestors; these phases acquired the characters of these 
ancestors by the law of earlier inheritance. 
*The shape of an infant’s foot should be noted. The toes nearly all of the 
same length—the second, however, being longest of all—the front part of the 
foot almost square across; while, behind, the heel is extremely small and 
attenuated. 
[ ¢ The big toe and the thumb are the only digits in which normally the last 
joint can be moved independently of moving other joints. ] 
