BIMANA. MAMMALIA. BIMANA. 



with grasping bauds, and in the majority these are even 

 furnished with opposable thumbs ; but these thumbs 

 are much shorter than in the human hand, and the 

 fingers are far from possessing the same amount of 

 independent mobility as those of man. It is to this 

 great perfection of his hand, together with the power 

 which he possesses of making use of this organ, inde- 

 pendently of the position of the other parts of the body, 

 in other words, its complete removal from the system 

 of locomotive organs, that man is mainly indebted for 

 his capability of employing the intellect with which it 

 is his proud prerogative to be endowed, and for his 

 power of obtaining a mastery over all the rest of the 

 animated creation. We cannot, in fact, imagine any 

 modification of the human form which would render it 

 a more fitting vehicle for the exercise of the mental 

 powers possessed by man ; nor can we conceive the 

 performance of the various actions instigated by those 

 powers by the instrumentality of any other known 

 form of organization. Thus, then, from the general 

 structure of the whole body, we obtain sufficient evi- 

 dence of the title possessed by the human species to 

 rank as a distinct order in our classification, to stand 

 out clearly at the head of the animated world, and not 

 merely as the highest member of the group of monkeys. 



The principal physical characters by which man is 

 distinguished at the first glance from all the other Mam- 

 malia are, therefore, as may be gathered from what we 

 have already stated, his adaptation to an erect posture ; 

 the great perfection of his anterior members, and espe- 

 cially of his hands; the large size of his brain and skull; 

 and the comparative smallness of the facial bones. 

 Besides these we find other physical peculiarities which 

 equally serve to characterize the order Bimana. Each 

 jaw contains teeth of three kinds, namely, four incisors, 

 two canines, and ten molars ; and these are of nearly 

 equal height, and arranged in a continuous series in 

 each jaw, never exhibiting that diversity of size, or the 

 gaps separating the canines from the incisors or molars, 

 which occur in all other living mammals. The molars 

 have their crowns uniformly enamelled, more or less 

 cubical in form, and furnished with obtuse tubercles 

 on the upper surface, a conformation indicative of the 

 adaptation of the human species to a mixed diet. The 

 skin is naked, or but sparingly clothed with hairs, ex- 

 cept upon the head and some other parts of the body, 

 and the nails are all flat and broad. 



It is unnecessary to dwell upon the intellectual supe- 

 riority enjoyed by the human race over the lower 

 animals, as this must be sufficiently manifest to ever}' 

 one. The highest intelligence exhibited by an animal 

 must be regarded as inferior to that of a child of two or 

 three years old ; and it is only the astonishment felt at 

 witnessing the effects of education upon some of the 

 most highly-endowed creatures, that often leads the 

 superficial observer to attribute to them a higher degree 

 of reasoning power than they really possess. It is, also, 

 in the mind of man alone that has been implanted that 

 belief in the existence of a Deity and in the immortality 

 of his own soul, which is the foundation of all religious 

 sentiment a sentiment which, although often debased 

 by the most degrading superstitions, seems to be inher- 

 ent in the human race. 



There is one other manifestation of the intellectual 

 powers of man that must not be altogether passed over 

 in silence, namely, the faculty of speech, or of producing 

 and understanding articulate sounds. This appears to 

 be peculiar to the human species ; for, although there can 

 be no doubt that in many animals there is some power 

 of communicating intelligence from one individual to 

 another, none of them possess a language. It is by 

 means of this peculiar faculty that the progress of man- 

 kind is insured. It is by this that the knowledge 

 acquired and the discoveries made in one age, or in 

 one locality, are transmitted to later times or to distant 

 countries; whilst by the reduction of language to written 

 characters, the insecurity of oral tradition is got rid of, 

 and the influence of every discovery is extended and 

 made more permanent. 



We come now to one of the most difficult subjects 

 connected with the physical history of man the ques- 

 tion of the primitive unity or diversity of the human 

 species ; in other words, whether the original proge- 

 nitors of the entire human population of the globe 

 were perfectly identical in their essential characters, or 

 whether the diversity which we now observe in different 

 races be the result of a primary specific difference. 

 There is no doubt that when we compare together the 

 extreme varieties of humanity, as, for instance, Euro- 

 peans, Negroes, American Indians, Chinese, and Aus- 

 tralian savages, we may easily find in the form of the 

 head and face, the colour of the skin, the nature of the 

 hair and the general structure of the body, distinctive 

 characters, such as in most cases of zoological investi- 

 gation would lead us to regard these different forms as 

 belonging to so many species. But this question, unfor- 

 tunately, cannot be so easily settled ; because, between 

 these extremes of diversity we find so many inter- 

 mediate steps, so many points where the physical 

 characters of different marked varieties seem to be 

 intimately blended, that it is often impossible to say to 

 which of two supposed species a given tribe of men is 

 to be referred. 



If we take the opposite supposition, namely, that all 

 the varieties of man have been produced by the modifi- 

 cation of a single species, or to put the matter more 

 clearly, the progeny of a single pair, it is difficult to 

 conceive that mere climatal influences and differences 

 in the mode of life could have produced such immense 

 changes, not only in the colour, but also in the confor- 

 mation of different tribes. One of the strongest physical 

 arguments adduced in favour of the unity of the human 

 species consists in the continued fertility of mixed 

 races, even where the grounds for the establishment of 

 distinct species are apparently the strongest as, for 

 instance, in the progeny of Europeans and Negroes. 

 But this argument is fallacious, as, although the majority 

 of animal hybrids may be sterile, there are undoubtedly 

 cases in which 'this rule is departed from ; indeed, it is 

 not improbable that some of our most valuable domestic 

 animals are hybrids. The test of colour, which is 

 often relied upon as an indication of variation distinctly 

 referable to a recognizable cause, namely, the influence 

 of a greater or less degree of heat, does not always 

 apply; for although we may state as a general rule, that 

 the inhabitants of hot plains are darker than those of 



