EXCURSIONS OF AN EVOLUTIONIST 



ing undergone since then changes parallel to 

 those which have affected the apes, or to those 

 which have affected generally such Miocene 

 genera as have survived down to our times? 

 No remains of any such creature have been 

 found, but it is indisputable that artificially 

 chipped flints and the artificially cut rib of an 

 extinct species of manatee have been discovered 

 in mid-Miocene strata in France. Mr. Daw- 

 kins is inclined to adopt M. Gau dry's sugges- 

 tion that the flints may have been chipped and 

 the rib cut by the great man-like ape, the dry- 

 opithecus ; for although it is not known that 

 any existing apes are in the habit of chipping 

 flints or cutting bones, yet it is not impossible 

 that the dryopithecus may have somewhat sur- 

 passed the present apes in intelligence. On the 

 other hand, M. de Mortillet regards these relics 

 as conclusive proof of the existence of man in 

 mid-Miocene Gaul. The question can hardly 

 be decided at present ; but it does not seem to 

 me that Mr. Dawkins's line of argument, which 

 is so conclusive when applied to the Eocene 

 age, is equally conclusive when applied to the 

 Miocene. At an epoch when there were no 

 true apes as yet to be found, when even the 

 lemurs bore marks of kinship with the ances- 

 tors of ruminants and pachyderms, and when 

 the carnivorous type was but half developed, it 

 would clearly be idle to expect to find traces of 

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