196 NATURAL SELECTION ix 



men and women, wore the kangaroo -skin, which was their 

 only covering, not from any feeling of modesty, but over the 

 shoulders to keep the back dry and warm. A cloth over the 

 shoulders was also the national dress of the Maories. The 

 Patagonians wear a cloak or mantle over the shoulders, and 

 the Fuegians often wear a small piece of skin on the back, 

 laced on, and shifted from side to side as the wind blows. 

 The Hottentots also wore a somewhat similar skin over the 

 back, which they never removed, and in which they were 

 buried. Even in the tropics most savages take precautions 

 to keep their backs dry. The natives of Timor use the leaf 

 of a fan palm, carefully stitched up and folded, which they 

 always carry with them, and which, held over the back, forms 

 an admirable protection from the rain. Almost all the Malay 

 races, as well as the Indians of South America, make great 

 palm-leaf hats, four feet or more across, which they use during 

 their canoe voyages to protect their bodies from heavy showers 

 of rain ; and they use smaller hats of the same kind when 

 travelling by land. 



We find, then, that so far from there being any reason to 

 believe that a hairy covering to the back could have been 

 hurtful or even useless to prehistoric man, the habits of 

 modern savages indicate exactly the opposite view, as they 

 evidently feel the want of it, and are obliged to provide 

 substitutes of various kinds. The perfectly erect posture of 

 man may be supposed to have something to do with the dis- 

 appearance of the hair from his body while it remains on his 

 head ; but when walking, exposed to rain and wind, a man 

 naturally stoops forwards and thus exposes his back ; and the 

 undoubted fact that most savages feel the effects of cold and 

 wet most severely in that part of the body, sufficiently demon- 

 strates that the hair could not have ceased to grow there merely 

 because it was useless, even if it were likely that a character 

 so long persistent in the entire order of mammalia could have 

 so completely disappeared under the influence of so weak a 

 selective power as a diminished usefulness. 



Man's Naked Skin could not have been produced by Natural Selection 



It seems to me, then, to be absolutely certain that natural 



selection could not have produced man's hairless body by 



