5494 Zoology: its present Fhasis 



appreciation of human anatomy, and that, in point of fact, no such 

 resemblances really exist, — who has asserted that, anatomically, there 

 is a gap, a link, not yet filled up between the bimana and the highest 

 quadrumana ; but he also thinks that, as in Nature's scheme there can 

 be no deficient link, that the scale must be perfect, so this gap will be 

 filled up in time by fossil discoveries or by the further development of 

 life on the globe. Close consanguinity, then, between the human kind 

 and any other animal is thus denied, both by the anatomist and the 

 naturalist ; by the anatomist, on the ground that the pretended resem- 

 blances found by the merely comparative anatomist arise from his igno- 

 rance of minute human anatomy ; by the naturalist, on other grounds, 

 no doubt, but mainly, I presume, on the fact of infecundity of union 

 between the different species or genera, or (to use the phrase of modern 

 naturalists) there is neither continuous nor limited fecundity, and so 

 there is no consanguinity ; that is, there is no common parentage, 

 either specific or generic. On this latter point we want the evidence 

 both of the anatomist and of experience, and so the question must be 

 allowed to remain where it is ; Science offers no aid to its solution. 

 In the matter of experience or direct experiment, it has been said, but 

 on no safe or assured ground, that the opinions of the wild Bosjesmen, 

 natives of the Calihari desert, and of the arid regions through which 

 the beauteous Gariep rolls its silvery stream, are in favour of both 

 forms of fecundity, that is, of the specific and generic, and that the 

 union of the gigantic baboon inhabiting these wild regions with the 

 JBosjesman is prolific. It is a curious fact that, in speaking of this 

 almost incredible circumstance, they (the Bosjesmen) speak of the 

 product as a male, thus in one sense supporting and in another 

 refuting the law established by Buffon, that as regards the product of 

 different species, the male influence predominated to a" remarkable 

 extent; but the Bosjesmen affirm that, although the product be male, 

 the form is strictly human or nearly so ; also the moral character. On 

 the other hand, we find in a newspaper notice of this day (June 25) 

 that, in the little island of Tristan da Cunha, there are about seventy- 

 two persons, the produce of one English artilleryman and a few men- 

 of-war's-men with some negresses brought from St. Helena. The 

 present progeny are said to show very little of the black blood, but to 

 be a really good-looking, strong race of people. About thirty-five 

 were desirous of leaving the island with their cattle, &c. But it is 

 with regret 1 have to observe that such observations are in no w r ay 

 to be depended on, and are indeed of little or no value. As neither 

 Science nor experience enlightens us on this extraordinary point, no- 

 thing can be said for or against the opinion : the practical view is the 

 safest: go back to the monumental records of Egypt, and you will 

 never find depicted on them any men or any animals which cannot 

 now be perfectly recognised. Had such monstrous unions ever been 

 productive, we have the evidence of Herodotus, to prove to the most 

 sceptical on this point, that the moral code of ancient Egypt was 

 sufficiently lax to have tested the result of such unions in such a way 

 as to leave nothing to be desired. 



