XV Darwinism applied to man 451 



Asia and the larger Malay Islands. These last are far less like 

 man than the other three, one or other of which has at 

 various times been claimed to be the most man -like of the 

 apes and our nearest relations in the animal kingdom. The 

 question of the degree of resemblance of these animals to 

 ourselves is one of great interest, leading, as it does, to some 

 important conclusions as to our origin and geological antiquity, 

 and we will therefore briefly consider it. 



If we compare the skeletons of the orang or chimpanzee 

 with that of man, we find them to be a kind of distorted 

 copy, every bone corresponding (with very few exceptions), 

 but altered somewhat in size, proportions, and position. So 

 great is this resemblance that it led Professor Owen to 

 remark : " I cannot shut my eyes to the significance of that 

 all-pervading similitude of structure — every tooth, every bone, 

 strictly homologous — which makes the determination of the 

 difference between Homo and Pithecus the anatomist's diffi- 

 culty.'^ 



The actual differeif^es in the skeletons of these apes and 

 that of man — that is, diff'erences dependent on the presence 

 or absence of certain bones, and not on their form or position 

 — have been enumerated by ^Ir. Mivart as follows: — (1) In 

 the breast-bone consisting of but two bones, man agrees with 

 the gibbons ; the chimpanzee and gorilla having this part 

 consisting of seven bones in a single series, while in the 

 orang they are arranged in a double series of ten bones. (2) 

 The normal number of the ribs in the orang and some gibbons 

 is twelve pairs, as in man, while in the chimjDanzee and gorilla 

 there are thirteen pairs. (3) The orang and the gibbons also 

 agree with man in having five lumbar vertebrae, while in the 

 gorilla and the chimpanzee there are but four, and sometimes 

 only three. (4) The gorilla and chimpanzee agree with man 

 in having eight small bones in the ^vi^ist, while the orang and 

 the gibbons, as well as all other monkeys, have nine.^ 



The differences in the form, size, and attachments of the 

 various bones, muscles, and other organs of these apes and 



1 Man and Apes. By St. George Mivart, F.R.S., 1873. It is an 

 interesting fact (for wliich I am indebted to Mr. E. B. Poulton) that the 

 human embryo possesses the extra rib and wrist-bone referred to above in 

 (2) and (4) as occurring in some of the apes. 



