EXTINCT ANIMALS 



is a very elaborate and difficult question, and 

 one which I do not propose to deal with at any 

 length. It is connected, of course, with the 

 whole doctrine of the origin of the different 

 kinds of animals. We all recognize now that 

 there has been a gradual development of the 

 different forms of animals by natural birth, 

 from ancestral forms more or less Hke themselves. 

 But the more remote we get from the present 

 day, in the line of descent, the less like are the 

 ancestors to the present form. The original 

 parental forms have given rise to very different . 

 branches of descent. The descendants of one 

 ancestral form have branched out in different 

 directions : just in the same way as some 

 person named Smith at the time of the Con- 

 queror has given rise to all sorts of Smiths. 

 Some of them perhaps are still actually metal- 

 workers, others have become Ministers of State 

 and Right Honourable judges ; others have 

 great possessions ; but they can all be traced 

 back to the one original Smith. So many Hving 

 animals of various appearance and form can be 

 traced back to one ancient ancestral form, and 

 these again to other more primitive ancestral 

 forms. 



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