THE PATH OF EVOLUTION 



changed this. Man, naked, weak, and born without 

 weapons of offence or defence, deteriorated, physically, 

 in his merely brutal powers from those of his ances- 

 tors. He was forced to leave the shelter and safety 

 of his arboreal existence by his increasing unfitness 

 for that life and his greater adaptation for life on the 

 open land. The very existence of his race was threat- 

 ened, and seemed destined to be ended. With the 

 greater intelligence that improvement in his brain 

 made available, he learned how to keep himself from 

 cold, to contrive means and implements to defend 

 himself, to destroy his enemies and to kill his prey ; 

 for Man had become a carniverous, or, at least, an 

 omniverous, animal, in place of living only on fruits, 

 seeds, eggs and insects as his Simian or even Troglo- 

 dyte relatives had done. The increase of brain prob- 

 ably needed more nitrogenous food to keep up its 

 growth and develop its faculties. The discovery of 

 the use of fire, and the way to obtain and preserve it, 

 must have modified the course of his whole life. 



To what extent the modification of the Simian 

 type had taken place, and at what time relatively 

 thereto the power of speech was evolved, is a problem 

 upon which little light can be thrown. It is pre- 

 sumed that as nearly all the Simian race are gregarious 

 (excepting the gorilla, which is polygamous only) 



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