EVIDENCES OF EVOLUTION 37 



fashioned generalized types which link to- 

 gether a number of now divergent stocks; but 

 perhaps we have said enough to show that 

 the facts brought to light by the explorations 

 of palaeontologists are suggestive of the 

 evolutionist interpretation, and there is no 

 other reading of the rock-record that does 

 not leave the facts enigmatical. In empha- 

 sizing the importance of this line of argu- 

 ment, Huxley said: "The primary and direct 

 evidence in favour of Evolution can be fur- 

 nished only by palaeontology. The geological 

 record, so soon as it approaches completeness, 

 must, when properly questioned, yield either 

 an affirmative or a negative answer: if Evo- 

 lution has taken place there will its mark be 

 left; if it has not taken place there will lie its 

 refutation." But it is more consistent with 

 the science of to-day to put the case more 

 confidently, and we would quote the opinion 

 of a living palaeontologist of high achieve- 

 ment, Professor W. B. Scott of Princeton: 

 "The geological record is not so hopelessly 

 incomplete as Darwin believed it to be. Since 

 *The Origin of Species' was written our 

 knowledge of that record has been enor- 

 mously extended, and we now possess no 

 complete volumes, it is true, but some re- 

 markably full and illuminating chapters. 

 The main significance of the whole lies in the 



