SEXUAL SELECTION IN RELATION TO MAN 775 



ability, even within the limits of the same race, ceases to 

 be remarkable.'* 



With respect to the beard in man, if we turn to our best 

 guide, the Quadrumana, we find beards equally developed 

 in both sexes in many species, but in some, either confined 

 to the males, or more developed in them than in the females. 

 From this fact and from the curious arrangement, as well as 

 the bright colors of the hair about the heads of many mon- 

 keys, it is highly probable, as before explained, that the 

 males first acquired their beards through sexual selection 

 as an ornament, transmitting them in most cases, equally 

 or nearly so, to their offspring of both sexes. We know 

 from Eschrichf that with mankind the female as well as 

 the male foetus is furnished with much hair on the face, 

 especially round the mouth; and this indicates that we 

 are descended from progenitors of whom both sexes were 

 bearded. It appears, therefore, at first sight probable that 

 man has retained his beard from a very early period, while 

 woman lost her beard at the same time that her body became 

 almost completely divested of hair. Even the color of our 

 beards seems to have been inherited from an ape-like pro- 

 genitor; for when there is any difference in tint between 

 the hair of the head and the beard, the latter is lighter 

 colored in all monkeys and in man. In those Quadrumana 

 in which the male has a larger beard than that of the female, 

 it is'fully developed only at maturity, just as with mankind; 

 and it is possible that only the later stages of development 

 have been retained by man. In opposition to this view of 

 the retention of the beard from an early period is the fact 

 of its great variability in different races, and even within 



** Hardly any view advanced in this work has met with so much disfavor 

 (see, for instance, Spengel, "Die Fortschritte des Darwinismus, " 1874, p. 80) 

 as the above explanation of the loss of hair in mankind through sexual selec- 

 tion ; but none of the opposed arguments seem to me of much weight, in com- 

 parison with the facts showing that the nudity of t;he skin is to a certain extent 

 a secondary sexual character in man and in some of the Quadrumana. 



'5 "Ueber die Eiehtung der Haare am Menschlichen Korpe," in Mliller's 

 "Archiv fiir Anat. und Phys.," 1837, s. 40. 



