688 THE DESCENT OF MAN. 



With respect to the beard in man, if we turn to our best 

 guide, the Quadrumana, we find beards equally developed 

 in both sexes of many species, but in some, either confined 

 to the males, or more developed in them than in the females. 

 From this fact and from the curious arrangement, as well 

 as the bright colors of the hair about the heads of many 

 monkeys, it is highly probable, as before explained, that 

 the males first acquired their beards through sexual selec- 

 tion as an ornament, transmitting them in most cases, 

 equally or nearly so, to their offspring of both sexes. We 

 know from Eschricht* that with mankind the female as 

 well as the male fetus is furnished with much hair on the 

 face, especially round the mouth; and this indicates that 

 we are descended from progenitors of whom both sexes 

 were bearded. It appears, therefore, at first sight probable 

 that man has retained his beard from a very early period, 

 while woman lost her beard at the same time that her body 

 became almost completely divested of hair. Even the color 

 of our beards seems to have been inherited from an ape- 

 like progenitor; for when there is any difference in tint 

 between the hair of the head and the beard, the latter is 

 lighter colored in all, monkeys and in man. In those 

 Quadrumana in which the male has a larger beard than 

 that of the female, it is fully developed only at maturity, 

 just as with mankind; and it is possible that only the latei 

 stages of development have been retained by man. In op- 

 position to this view of the retention of the beard from an 

 early period is the fact of its great variability in different 

 races, and even within the same race; for this indicates 

 reversion long lost characters being very apt to vary on 

 reappearance. 



Nor must we overlook the part which sexual selection 

 may have played in later times; for we know that with 

 savages the men of the beardless races take infinite pains 

 in eradicating every hair from their faces as something 

 odious, while the men of the bearded races feel the greatest 



ismus," 1874, p. 80) as the above explanation of the loss of hair in 

 mankind through sexual selection; but none of the opposed argu- 

 ments seem to me of much weight, in comparison with the facts 

 showing that the nudity of the skin is to a certain extent a secon- 

 dary sexual character in man and in some of the Quadrumana. 



*" Ueber die Richtung der Haare am Menschlichen Kfirper," in 

 Muller's " Archiv fur Anat, und Phys.," 1837, s. 40. 



