THE NEANDERTHAL, SKULL. 153 



11. Professor TAIT, in his Recent Re- 

 searches in Physical Science, combats the 

 speculations of Darwin, who " tells us that 

 even for a comparatively brief portion of 

 recent geological history, three hundred 

 millions of years will not suffice" to 

 enable him to discover the missing link, 

 which he thinks might easily be found, 

 were it not for what he considers "the 

 imperfection of the geological record." 

 Hence Professor TAIT points out that 

 "The Law of the Dissipation of Energy, 

 discovered by Sir W. THOMSON, enables us 

 distinctly to say that the present order 

 of things has not been evolved through 

 infinite past time by the agency of laws 

 now at work, but must have had a distinct 

 beginning. . . . Ten millions of years is 

 the utmost we can give to geologists for 

 their speculations as to the history of the 

 lowest orders of fossils, and for all the 

 changes that have taken place on the 

 earth's surface since vegetable life of the 

 lowest known form was capable of existing 

 there." 



