PHENOMENA OF CONVEKGENCE. '27 



thaumatogenously created ? Or was the transfer- 

 ence real, consequent on nomogeny, or the incoming 

 of species by secondary law, the mode and way of 

 operation of which we have still to learn ? Certain 

 it is that the lost reptilian structures specified, are 

 now manifested by quadrupeds with a higher con- 

 dition of cerebral, circulatory, respiratory, and legu- 

 mentary systems a condition the acquisition of 

 which is unintelligible 'to the writer on either the 

 Lamarkian or the Darwinian hypothesis.' 



It is unintelligible to us also, for we do not 

 in the slightest degree imagine that those coinci- 

 dences, which are neither great nor astonishing, 

 have to be understood by means of Darwin's hypo- 

 thesis. There is, in fact, no question whatever 

 about transferred conditions of organisation, for the 

 coincidence is confined to mere adaptations, and, 

 in part, very superficial ones ; adaptations which, 

 in some cases, are * intelligible ' without any diffi- 

 culty. With the help of our present prototypes 

 and the above fossil material, we can imagine all 

 kinds of substitutes for our wolves and the other 

 beasts of prey. It is extremely probable that many 

 of the earlier, and to us unknown mammals, in- 

 herited a uniform set of teeth (perhaps somewhat 

 like the dolphin's) direct from their ancestors of 



