VIII DEVELOPMENT OF CETACEA iii 



there would by this time be some approach to a concord on the 

 subject. 



I have just received a quantity of skulls and bones of the 

 Andaman islanders, a most singular race, combining woolly hair 

 with round heads and other cranial characters not found in any 

 other UlotricJn. 1 want to work out their affinities, as I think 

 they may throw some light upon the classification of man, or 

 perhaps dispel some false light, which is the next best thing ; but 

 I am disabled at present, having had to undergo a surgical opera- 

 tion, and shall be confined to the house for about another week. 



I shall always, now or afterwards, think myself fortunate if I 

 can be of any use to you in your researches in these subjects, 

 more especially as, if you will allow me to say so, I am very 

 grateful to you for all that you have said and done of late in 

 reference to public and international affairs. When this flood 

 of feeling, which has taken possession of the public mind, has 

 subsided, with what satisfaction will it be felt and recorded that 

 there were voices, and those not of the least wise or able of our 

 country, raised in protest and warning against national folly and 

 injustice. 



Professor Flower to the Duke of Argyll 



Lincoln's Inn Fields, February i6, 1883. 



I think there can be little doubt that the rudimentary pelvis 

 and hind limbs of the whale are parts that are dwindling away 

 in consequence of having lost their function. Recently Professor 

 Struthers of Aberdeen has described very minutely these struc- 

 tures in a number of examples which he got the whalers to bring 

 him from the Northern Seas, and he has shown not only three 

 distinct bones, representing pelvis, femur, and tibia, with well- 

 formed joints and ligaments connecting them, but, what is more 

 remarkable, a complete set of muscles, the counterpart, in a 

 reduced and functionless condition, of those found in mammals 

 with perfect hind limbs. His observations are pubhshed in the 

 Journal of Anatomy and Physiology^ 1 8 8 1 . 



All this seems to confirm many other indications that the 

 Cetacea were originally terrestrial mammals which have been 



