THE EVOLUTION OF MAN 



one of them laying special emphasis on certain 

 points of the old form, showing the naked newt 

 in one place and the more reptile-like extinct 

 armored amphibian in another, and a genuine 

 reptile in still another place. The reptilians may 

 at first have assumed such forms as we still ob- 

 serve in Hatteria, and out of genuine reptiles 

 developed the birds at a much later period. Still 

 another side line would be represented by those 

 Theromorphoi of Cape Colony which, on the 

 whole, had a pronounced reptilian character, but 

 still preserved in their teeth and in a few other 

 points, such marks as have become typical later 

 on only for mammals. Finally, running parallel 

 with all the others the genuine mammals would 

 have gone their own way. 



There is nothing of any consequence to pre- 

 vent us from assuming that these mammals, 

 which reached their highest stage in man, formed 

 the central line or the crown of the entire line of 

 descent. At any rate, they were the most intel- 

 ligent line, and they may also have been the most 

 favored physically and have deviated less from 

 the characteristics of the great archetype. In 

 view of all the facts known in this case, these 

 conclusions seem certainly logical and sound. 



It is true that genuine fossil remains of this 



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