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NATURE 



[October 31, 1912 



marked variations which so frequently are seen by 

 the students of human anatomy, but a multitude of 

 minor structural features such as might slowly accu- 

 mulate in the course of the differentiation of one race 

 from another. 



When one comes to realise the extremely complex 

 structure and finely adjusted nature of the human 

 brain, it becomes very apparent that any addition to 

 the most essential structure of the human body must 

 be the result of an extremely slow process of growth. 

 Only one line of evidence shakes our belief in the slow 

 rate of human evolution, and that is the study of 

 certain diseases of growth to which man is liable. 

 We have come to realise in recent years that we are, 

 as regards face, figure, stature, and nature, largely 

 what our internal glands and secretions have made us. 

 Growth itself is definitely regulated by means of sub- 

 stances set free by certain glands of the body. We 

 are absolutely certain that a marked disturbance of 

 these glands will, in the course of a few years, defin- 

 itely transfigure the individual to which they belong. 

 Nature seems to have at her command a means for 

 executing rapid advances, but when we survey what 

 we know of man's past history, and mark the changes 

 he is subject to in the present, we see no sign of her 

 having resorted to such a means. 



There is another route by which we may approach 

 the problem of man's antiquity. Man does not stand 

 alone — he has distant and rather despised relations — 

 the great antliropoid apes. Although the structural 

 hiatus between him and them is wide, yet when we 

 compare the two types we see that there is a multi- 

 tude of resemblances, so intimate and so peculiar 

 that we cannot explain them e.xcept by supposing 

 that man and the great anthropoids had a common 

 ancestor at one stage of the earth's history. The 

 great anthropoids have also a distant and primitive 

 living relative — the gibbon. The gibbon, in turn, 

 while foreshadowing in his body the structural pecu- 

 liarities of his more august relatives, finds his cousins 

 by descent in more lowly forms still — the monkevs 

 of the Old World and the monkeys of the New. Of 

 these tvi'-o groups the morilieys of the New World are 

 the nearest to the original stock which gave rise to 

 the higher primates. It was through such a lineage 

 that man rose to reach his present estate. 



If, then, we are to ascertain the approximate date 

 • — or, to put it in other words, the possible date — at 

 which man appeared, we must first search for the 

 earliest traces of the basal forms of the higher 

 primates which lead towards the human line. The 

 earliest traces wo have discovered as vet were de- 

 scribed by Dr. Max Schlosser only two years ago. In 

 the very oldest Oligocene formation of the Fayoum, 

 Egypt, the teeth and jaws of three primates were 

 discovered. Two of these are allied to the South 

 American apes, the other is a forerunner of the 

 gibbons. These Fayoum fossils are of the highest 

 importance to the solution of our problem. Their 

 discovery assures us that at such an earlv date in the 

 evolution of mammals the .South American apes and 

 pro-gibbons were already in existence. They are 

 highly evolved forms, and it is not unlikely that they 

 appeared at a much earlier date. In European strata 

 of the period following the Oligocene — the Miocene — 

 many teeth and jaws of a form of gibbon, which 

 differ only in slight and trivial details from the teeth 

 of living gibbons, have been discovered during th'^ 

 past fifty years. 



Here, then, we have the assurance that an animal 

 which springs closely from the stock giving rise to 

 man has come down to us with but little change 

 through the leaeues of time marked by the Miocene. 

 Pliocene, and Pleistocene formations. Bv the middle 

 of the Miocene we know the great anthropoids wore 



NO. 2244, VOL. go] 



in existence; it is most unlikely that the traces we 

 have discovered mark their first appearance. With 

 the evolution of the great anthropoids the appearance 

 of a human ancestry as a separate stock is possible. 

 From every point of view it is most probable that the 

 human stock became differentiated at the same time 

 as the great anthropoids. On the evidence afforded 

 by our very imperfect knowledge of fossil forms of 

 apes, we are justified in assuming that a very primi- 

 tive form of man may have come into existence during 

 the Miocene period — at the very latest during the 

 early part of the Pliocene. Thus when we pursue 

 the question of man's antiquity by studying the forms 

 of primates contained in the Tertiary strata, we find 

 reason to extend the possible date of his origin at 

 least a geological epoch beyond what is allowed by 

 the strictly orthodox. We are unable, however, to 

 find evidence in support of the more extravagant 

 claims of the ultra-heterodox represented by M. Rutot. 



There is still another and a very important line of 

 evidence bearing on the antiquity of man. We ha,ve, 

 in the most cursory manner, followed the evolution 

 of various ancestral forms of ape and anthropoid 

 from the past towards the present ; I propose now to 

 follow the history of man's evolution, so far as we 

 yet know it, from the present into the geologicat 

 past. We are all evolutionists nowadays, and it is 

 but natural that every one of us should expect man 

 to become more anthropoid and more brutal the 

 further we trace him into the past. What have we 

 found? At the close of the Pleistocene period, which 

 even orthodox and conservative geologists admit to 

 have come to an end some 15,000 years ago, the men 

 of Europe in stature and in size of brain were at 

 least our equals. In tooth, limb, and bone they were 

 more robust. When, however, we turn our eyes to 

 France and pass backwards in the Pleistocene to the 

 epoch marked by the last or fourth of the cold cycles 

 which subdivided that period, modern man disappears ; 

 his place is taken by a human being of an altogether 

 different kind — a human race or species to which the 

 name of Neanderthal has been given by international- 

 consent. 



During the last six years, thanks to the enthusiasm, 

 industry, and genius of French anthropologists, the 

 remains of four individuals of this race have been un- 

 earthed. The strata in which these remains were 

 found contain stone implements of the type known 

 as Mousterian, and of animals belonging to a cold 

 climate. Neanderthal man appears suddenlv in this 

 later part of the Pleistocene, and as suddenly dis- 

 appears, to be replaced by inodern man. It is impos- 

 sible to conceive that, just at the close of the Pleis- 

 tocene period. Neanderthal man was suddenly con- 

 verted into modern man. Think for a minute of the 

 interpretation you would give of the Australian strata 

 that are being laid down now. The older deposits 

 contain the remains of aborigines, the newer 

 Europeans. You do not suppose that the aborigines- 

 are suddenlv transformed to European. You must 

 apply the same interpretation to the human remains- 

 found in the later Pleistocene. There was a super- 

 session, not a transformation of races. We must infer, 

 then, that at the end of the Pleistocene period there 

 were two distinct races of mankind — Neanderthal and' 

 modern. That is a fact which our French colleagues 

 seem to grasp with difficultv. 



To follow the history of modern man into the past 

 we shall return to England. It is a mystery why 

 Neanderthal remains have not been discovered in Eng- 

 land ; thev ought to be found, and a rumour is now 

 current that they have been found. The oldest re- 

 mains so far unearthed in England all belong to the 

 modern type of man. They take us a long way 

 further into the Pleistocene than the era of Neander- 



