178 EVOLUTION OF LIFE. 
of Bronze, a further progress being exhibited in the Age 
oflron. Ethnologists consider the primitive man to have 
been lower than the lowest of existing Savages, more ape- 
like even than the extinct human races, whose remains we 
have briefly noticed. According to philologists, the primi- 
tive man was speechless, and the earliest languages babble. 
All kinds of evidence negative the idea of man having 
fallen from a high estate, but support the view of his having 
developed from a lower one. The descent of man is indeed 
an ascent. 
It does not seem out of place to briefly call attention 
to the probable spreading of the human species over the 
earth, which, according to Prof. Haeckel, was as follows. 
Starting in Lemuria (see plate on distribution of races), 
the posterity of the primitive men diverged towards Africa, 
Australia, the Indian Archipelago, and Asia; the Hot- 
tentots, Caffres, and Negroes being the descendants of 
those who came to Africa, while the Papuans, Australians, 
and Malays are equally the posterity of three stems. 
Diverging from the Malay stem appeared the Drave and 
Mongolian races. The Draves, peopling India, passed 
towards Arabia, and divided into the stems of the North 
African races and Europeans; while the Mongolians, passing 
through China and spreading over Northern and Eastern 
Asia, finally crossed over Behring Straits and peopled the 
Americas. “This view of the gradual spreading of the races 
of men from a common point situated between Asia and 
Africa seems to be a fair conclusion from what is known 
of Ethnology and Philology. 
While admitting that the different races have descended 
from a common stock, it does not necessarily follow that 
the primitive men came from a single pair. Thus, possibly, 
different apes may have been the ancestors of the Malay 
and South African races. It is interesting in this respect 
to observe that the Orang, who is found in the Malay 
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