THE DESCENT OF THE PRIMATES 21 



advocated. And so the outcome of all these 

 considerations may be said to be a definite sim- 

 plification of the line of descent of man and the 

 higher monkeys. We need no longer be puzzled 

 at that rapid increase in complication of the 

 all-important placentary arrangement which we 

 were bound to admit as long as we accorded 

 to the Lemurs any place among our direct 

 ancestry. 



We may now safely say that these complica- 

 tions are of an ever so much more remote anti- 

 quity, and that the insectivorous predecessor of 

 the Eocene Primates may in many respects have 

 been a further differentiated mammal than its 

 contemporary, the ancestor of the Tertiary 

 Lemurs. 



The tiny little Tarsius has thus shown us that 

 by judiciously converging anatomical, embryo- 

 logical, and palseontological sidelights into one 

 focus, we may sometimes succeed in clearing up 

 genetic relationships that would otherwise re- 

 main hopelessly intricate or vaguely confusing. 



We must now try to turn to more general ac- 

 count what we have here established, remem- 

 bering that in so doing we are starting on a 

 hypothetical track that leads us somewhat fur- 



