110 ANIMAL LIFE AND HUMAN PROGEESS 



it may be well to raise a voice — though maybe a feeble one 

 — against the ready acceptance of this, the newest departure 

 of the school which sees only an easy gradation from the 

 monkey to the ape and thence to Man. 



One other point demands attention. It must be remem- 

 bered that when Darwin's work was pubhshed, and when 

 opinion was being recast so hurriedly, there was but Uttle 

 appreciation of those marvellous adaptations of animal 

 structure by which creatures living similar lives become 

 modified along similar lines. This is the phenomenon known 

 as convergence, and we know quite well how wonderfully 

 animals of utterly different stocks may come to resemble each 

 other in a host of superficial features. The undoubted action 

 of such a factor should ever be present in the mind of any one 

 who would attempt a classification by hkenesses which has 

 any pretence to represent genetic relationship. 



We will therefore attempt to apply two cautions in study- 

 ing the presumed immediate ancestors of Man, the first that 

 we do not overlook differences when we find them, and the 

 second that we do not overrate likenesses which may be due 

 to nothing more than similarity of adaptation in animals 

 living in similar environments. 



The immediate ancestors of Man constitute the group 

 known as the Primates, and this group contains what Haeckel 

 and others have conceived to be a phylogenetic series com- 

 posed of (1) the lemurs or Strepsorrhini, (2) the Tarsii, (3) 

 the New World monkeys or Platyrrhini, (4) the Old World 

 monkeys or Catarrhini, (5) the anthropoid apes, and (6) Man. 

 The position of the lemurs with regard to the rest of the 

 families constituting the order has been frequently debated. 

 Without entering into details, I shall have to be content with 

 the mere statement that in all parts of their bodily structure 

 lemurs show so many, and such deep-seated, difierences from 

 the Anthropoidea or monkeys, that the value of the trivial and 

 superficial likenesses is far outweighed. When the whole 

 anatomy of the lemurs is taken into account it becomes 

 apparent that they are severed so sharply from the rest of 

 the Primates that their retention within this order seems 



