HI 



ON SOME FOSSIL REMAINS OF MAN 



I HAVE endeavoured to show, in the preceding 

 Essay, that the ANTHROPINI, or Man Family, form 

 a very well-defined group of the Primates, between 

 which and the immediately following Family, the 

 CATARHINI, there is, in the existing world, the 

 same entire absence of any transitional form or 

 connecting link, as between the CATARHINI and 

 PLATYRHINI. 



It is a commonly received doctrine, however, 

 that the structural intervals between the various 

 existing modifications of organic beings may be 

 diminished, or even obliterated, if we take into 

 account the long and varied succession of animals 

 and plants which have preceded these now living 

 and which are known to us only by their fossilized 

 remains. How far this doctrine is well based, how 

 far, on the other hand, as our knowledge at 

 present stands, it is an overstatement of the real 

 facts of the case, and an exaggeration of the con- 



