108 ANIMAL LIFE AND HUMAN PROGRESS 



the origin of a human characteristic be sought first in the 

 anthropoids, then in the monkeys and lemurs, and afterwards 

 in a " lower," pronograde mammal. The following of this 

 line of investigation has led to the production of some extra- 

 ordinary nonsense. 



It is natural to ask if there were no dissentient voices raised 

 against the trend of thought which saw no difficulties in the 

 path of " end on " evolution in the culmination of the scale 

 of life. As a matter of fact there were many, but they pro- 

 duced but little effect upon the rising tide of thought ; and it 

 is fair to say that the idea of Man's immediate origin from the 

 existing Primate series, which was so repugnant to many when 

 first enunciated, gradually became familiar, and in the end 

 was accepted without question by the majority of mankind. 

 Such a progress seems to be typical ; for when once opinion has 

 been rudely shocked and has subsequently become anaesthetic 

 and reconciled, it will swallow the disturbing theory without 

 hesitation ; it would indeed rather hug it in blind faith than 

 face another disturbance of ideas. We all became reconciled 

 to the belief that we were the perfected product of the " end 

 on " evolution of the Primates, that the anthropoid apes were 

 our immediate ancestors, and that behind them stood the 

 evolutionary gradations of Old World monkeys, New World 

 monkeys and lemurs. That is the position into which we 

 were first hustled and into which we have since quietly 

 drifted. 



Since the time of Huxley and Haeckel the study of the 

 highest steps of the scale of life has fallen, for the most part, 

 upon the shoulders of the human anatomist, and it must be 

 owned that the burden has sat but lightly upon this already 

 overworked individual. A more fitting recipient of the mantle 

 would have been the comparative anatomist ; but it is our 

 misfortune that we have to own that, in our own country 

 at any rate, the comparative anatomist ^as not given himself 

 greatly to the consideration of this problem. Richard Owen 

 was England's comparative anatomist during the Darwinian 

 period, and there is no need to recall those bitter times of his 

 dying effort to stem the tide. Mivart may be regarded as his 



