THE GENEALOGY OF MAN. 221 



unquestionably belongs in his dentition, in the structure 

 of his nostrils, and some other respects, to the Catarrhine 

 or Old World division ; nor does he resemble the Platyr- 

 rhines more closely than the Catarrhines in any charac- 

 ters, excepting in a few of not much importance and 

 apparently of an adaptive nature. It is, therefore, against 

 all probability that some New World species should have 

 formerly varied and produced a man-like creature, with 

 all the distinctive characters proper to the Old World 

 division, losing at the same time all its own distinctive 

 characters. There can, consequently, hardly be a doubt 

 that man is an offshoot from the Old World Simian 

 stem, and that, under a genealogical point of view, he 

 must be classed with the Catarrhine division. 



p n . And, as man from a genealogical point of 



view belongs to the Catarrhine or Old World 

 stock, we must conclude, however much the conclusion 

 may revolt our pride, that our early progenitors would 

 have been properly thus designated. But we must not 

 fall into the error of supposing that the early progeni- 

 tor of the whole Simian stock, including man, was identi- 

 cal with, or even closely resembled, any existing ape or 

 monkey. 



THE BIRTHPLACE OF MAX. 



Pace 155 ^ e are na ^rally led to inquire, where was 



the birthplace of man at that stage of descent 

 when our progenitors diverged from the Catarrhine stock ? 

 The fact that they belonged to this stock clearly shows 

 that they inhabited the Old World ; but not Australia 

 nor any oceanic island, as we may infer from the laws of 

 geographical distribution. In each great region of the 

 world the living mammals are closely related to the ex- 



