Animals Before Man 



the north the struggle for existence is so severe 

 that the Eskimo can make little or no progress ; 

 all he can do is to hold his own. Within 

 the tropics much the same state of affairs is 

 found for the very opposite reason ; life is 

 so easy that man takes little thought for 

 the morrow as to how he may be housed or 

 clothed, and very little thought as to how 

 he may be fed. Only in the broad expanse 

 of the so-called temperate zone are the con- 

 ditions such as to stimulate man to do his 

 best, and there has mankind made its great- 

 est progress. 



That relatives of man — many times removed, 

 to be sure — are even now in existence so small 

 and soft that they would leave no trace in a 

 fossil state, is one reason the more for believing 

 that similar forms preceded the advent of those 

 sufficiently advanced to have left their fossil 

 forms in the ancient rocks. 



The Colorado specimens are so very frag- 

 mentary that we can say little more about them 

 than that they show conclusively the existence 

 of back-boned animals even so early as the 



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