Significance of Anomalies.— At the outs 

 size the extreme complexity of evolution by 

 Variation, or in terms of medical science, u| 



When we speak of a part as " anomalous * 

 varies at birth from the ordinary or typical 

 minute, as the small slip of a tendon, or lar: 

 of a complete vertebra to the spinal column 

 that in the muscular system alone there arc 

 the average individual. It is clear that t 

 new type, so far as the muscular system i 

 consist in the accumulation of anomalie* k 

 direction by heredity. Thus the anomalous 

 generation may become the typical conditio 

 later generation, and we observe the par; 

 structure becoming an anomaly and an an 

 becoming typical; for example, the supraco 

 the humerus was once typical ; it is now am 

 dation in development of the wisdom tooth 

 lous ; it is now typical. 



The same principle applies to races whic 

 stages of evolution ; an anomaly ' 

 closure of the cranial sutures, is 



- 



in the black. 



the deductions of the Weismann school of evolutionists seem 

 to be founded upon the principle " de minimis non curat fez , 

 that we need onlv regard such major variations as can, ex 

 hypothesi, weigh in the scale of survival. Against tins I urge 

 that we must regard the evolution of particular structure, the 

 components of larger organs, the separate muscles an. »one> 

 for example, for the very reason that wlul. in s, im • "^^' ^ 

 play a most humble role in our economy we ran pio\ e ..y mi. 

 a doubt that they are in course ot evolution. mot 

 tions in foot structure, which are possibly ot vital importance 

 to a quadruped whose very existence may depend upon speed 

 sink Into obscurity as factors in the survival of the modern 

 the most unimportant details of 

 efore, to afford a far more crucial 

 1 Selection theory, 



The evolution ( 



