94 Evolution 



ago. We saw that that was an ag« of increasing cold, 

 of great physical changes, and of rapid biological 

 evolution. The bony fishes had now appeared In the 

 rivers, trees of a modern type and grasses covered the 

 hills and plains, birds of many kinds — owls, eagles, 

 swallows, parrots, etc. — filled the air, and the insect 

 world had representatives of all its orders. The new 

 lord of creation was the mammal — the kangaroo-like 

 creatures that spread from Australia to America. The 

 inevitable consequence of struggle amongst these — 

 differentiation — set in during the Cretaceous period, and 

 amongst the new types that appear in the Eocene are 

 ape-like creatures similar to the modern lemur. To this 

 group most zoologists look for the ancestor of the 

 Primates, though one or two go a step further back. 

 At all events the Eocene lemur (notably the Adapts, of 

 which skeletons are found in Prance) must have been a 

 very close relative of our Eocene ancestor, and may 

 represent it for us. Amongst the large modern group of 

 the Lemurs — scattered from Madagascar to Malaysia — 

 the black lemur is nearest to the early type (in 

 structure), but all of them will have evolved somewhat 

 since Eocene days. 



From the nature of the case we cannot identify any 

 fossil remains as belonging to our line until they bear an 

 actual human imprint, and this does not happen until 

 near the close of the Tertiary epoch. It is, however, 

 exceedingly improbable — to say the least — that any of 

 the ape-like remains we have belong to our line. In the 

 Miocene (mid-Tertiary) we find the first anthropoid ape 

 (Dryopithecus), besides some that approach the anthro- 

 poid, and a number of ordinary apes. Then we have the 

 " ape-man of Java" (Pithecanthropus), which some 

 authorities refer to the Miocene, some to the Pliocene, 

 and others leave uncertain. 



