152 THE DESCENT OF MAN. 



kno-tt', however, tliat some have retained the same form during 

 an enormous lapse of time. From what we see going on under 

 domestication, we learn that some of the co-descendants of the 

 same species may be not at all, some a little, and some greatly 

 changed, all within the same period. Thus it may have been 

 with man, who has undergone a great amount of modification in 

 certain characters in comparison with the higher apes. 



The great break in the organic chain between man and his 

 nearest allies, which cannot be bridged over by any extinct or 

 living species, has often been advanced as a grave objection to 

 the belief that man is descended from some lower form; but this 

 objection will not appear of much weight to those who, from 

 general reasons, believe in the general principle of evolution. 

 Breaks often occur in all parts of the series, some being wide, 

 sharp and defined, others less so in various degrees; as between 

 the orang and its nearest allies — between the Tarsius and the 

 other Lemuridffi — between the elephant, and in a more striking 

 manner between the Ornithorhynchus or Echidna, and all other 

 mammals. But these breaks depend merely on the number of 

 related forms which have become extinct. At some future period, 

 not very distant as measured by centuries, the civilized races 

 of man will almost certainly exterminate, and replace, the savage 

 races throughout the world. At the same time the anthropomor- 

 phous apes, as Professor Schaaffhausen has remarked," will no 

 doubt be exterminated. The break between man and his nearest 

 allies will then be wider, for it will intervene between man in 

 a more civilized state, as we may hope, even than the Caucasian, 

 and some ape as low as a baboon, instead of as now between the 

 negro or Australian and the gorilla. 



With respect to the absence of fossil remains, serving to con- 

 nect man with his ape-like progenitors, no one will lay much 

 stress on this fact who reads Sir C. Lyell's discussion,'" where 

 he shows that in all the vertebrate classes the discovery of fossil 

 remains has been a very slow and fortuitous process. Nor 

 should it be forgotten that those regions which are the most 

 likely to afflord remains connecting man with some extinct ape- 

 like creature, have not as yet been searched by geologists. 



Lower Stages in the Genealogy of Man. — We have seen that 

 man appears to have diverged from the Catarhines or Old "World 

 division of the Simiada, after these had diverged from the New 

 World division. We will now endeavor to follow the remote 

 traces of his genealogy, trusting principally to the mutual affin- 



18 'Anthropological Review,' April, 1867, p. 236. 



" 'Elements of Geology,' 1865, pp. 5S3-585. 'Antiquity of Man,' 1803, 

 p. 145. 



