APPARENT EXCEPTIONS. 209 



Livingstone found the natives of Africa debating a 

 question which belongs essentially to that science, 

 and involves the whole principle of the mental 

 process by which it is pursued. The debate was 

 on the question "whether the two toes of the 

 Ostrich represent the thumb and forefinger in 

 Man, or the little and ring-finger."* This is purely 

 a question of Comparative Anatomy. It is founded 

 on the instinctive perception that even between 

 two frames so widely separated as those of an 

 Ostrich and a Man there is a common Plan of 

 structure, with reference to which plan, parts 

 wholly dissimilar in appearance and in use, can 

 nevertheless be identified as "representative" of 

 each other : — that is, as holding the same relative 

 place in one Ideal Order of arrangement. 



The recognition of this idea in minds so rude is 

 not the less remarkable from the fact that both 

 sides in this African debate were wrong in their 

 practical application of the idea to the particular 

 case before them. Unity of design amidst variety 

 of form is so conspicuous and universal in the works 

 of Nature that the perception of it could not pos- 



1 The Zambezi and its Tributaries, p. 424. 



O 



