66 THE SCIENTIFIC EVIDENCES OF 



of organic affinities, becomes positively ridiculous 

 when applied to the case of embryonic structures, 

 which are destined to disappear before the animal 

 is born. Who, for instance, would have the 

 courage to affirm that the Deity had any such 

 motive in providing, not only the unborn young 

 of specially created salamanders, but also the 

 unborn young of specially created man, with 

 the. essential anatomical features of gills? 



But this remark leads us to consider a little 

 more attentively the anatomical features presented 

 by the human embryo. The gill-slits just 

 mentioned occur on each side of the neck, and 

 to them the arteries run in branching arches, 

 as in a fish. This, in fact, is the stage through 

 which the branchiae of a fish are developed, and 

 therefore in fish the slits remain open during 

 life, while the so called " visceral arches " throw 

 out filaments which receive the arterial branches 

 coming from the aortic arches, and so become 



