PREFACE ix 



tricuspid prototype, by extension, subdivision, and superaddition 

 of parts, and those of the latter from a multicuspid, by reduction, 

 confluence, and suppression. 1 Osborne has endeavoured to show 2 

 that the human molars may have been evolved out of a tri- 

 tubercular type. I would point out, on the other hand, that 

 during the tooth changes of the human subject of to-day, there 

 is indicated, on the part of the cheek-teeth, a progressive reduc- 

 tion of that type of tooth represented by the first molar. The 

 detailed facts concerning this process (cf. text, p. 160) appear to 

 me to be more in accord with the theory of multituberculism ; 

 and on this basis the suggestion arises whether the first molar may 

 not stand in a similar relationship to the wisdom tooth of the 

 multitubercular order as the deciduous molars do to it, the 

 entire series of modifications being those of advancing reduction 

 of a multitubercular type of tooth. 



No opportunity should be lost of excavating the Quaternary 

 deposits of all parts of the world, especially where mixed with 

 clays likely to be favourable to the preservation of human and 

 other remains. Now that the African continent is being 

 opened up, the scientific mind waits with longing for the 

 careful investigation of its Tertiary Lacustrine deposits. Hugh 

 Falconer long ago predicted that human remains would be 

 forthcoming in the Tertiary deposits of India, and no one con- 

 versant with recent work in Mammalian Palaeontology would 

 doubt that the remains of ancestral Man must be sought thus 

 far back in time. This prediction has been confirmed, by the 

 discovery in 1894, by Noetling, in the Yenangyoung Oil-field, 

 Burma, of flint flakes of early Pliocene date. I could desire 

 no higher reward for the labour expended in placing this 

 book before the English-speaking public than that it might 

 help to awaken the interest necessary to ensure such investiga- 

 tion. It may be added, as an appropriate comment, that the 

 interest in Dwarf Kaces, recently revived through African ex- 

 ploration and the fuller study of the natives of the Andaman 



1 For a fuller account of the history of these theories, and of the leading facts 

 upon which they rest, cf. Osborne, Americ. Naturalist, vol. xxii. p. 1067 ; and 

 Forsyth-Major, Proc. Zool. Soc., Lond., 1893, p. 196. 



- Awit. Anzeiger, Bd. vii. p. 740. Cf., however, the observations of Rose cited in 

 this volume (infra, pp. 158 and 159). 



