124 Permanence and Evolution. 



forms in existence, say toward the middle of the 

 secondary period, up to the highest possible 

 standard of efficiency, in these respects, pre- 

 serving the general type, rather than to have 

 invented so many wonderful modifications, only 

 indirectly affecting the preservation of indi- 

 vidual and race. Instead of which, we find in 

 these all-important points not progression, but 

 retrogression precisely the opposite course to 

 what natural selection would pursue. 



In the highest, therefore, according to Darwin, 

 the latest developed of brutes, the anthropoid 

 apes, we find considerably lower fertility than 

 in most other animals, a longer period of infancy 

 compared with the whole life of the creature, 

 and a most delicate constitution ; and it cannot 

 be said that an animal inhabiting the tropics 

 has no need of a constitution formed to resist 

 cold, for in all countries there are relatively 

 cold seasons, which would press hard upon a 

 chimpanzee or an orang. So that these high 



