570 The American Naturalist. [July, 
only found in the Apes and Lemurs, as a result the Anthro- 
poids and Lemuroids may be considered genetically related. 
I may add that the paleontological evidence supports this 
conclusion. 
I find on further study that Mivart’s views concerning the 
relations of the Lemurs and Apes are most unsatisfactory. He 
considers that the question of genetic relationship in classifi- 
cation should take a subordinate place, and if two groups of 
animals exhibit characters in common, it makes little differ- 
ence whether the characters be due to convergence or were in- 
herited from a common ancestor which gave origin to the two 
aggregations in question. In short, to Mivart classification is 
merely a convenience, and may or may not denote genetic re- 
lationship. Applying these principles to the arrangement of 
the Primates, Mivart merely placed the Lemurs and Apes to- 
gether because they exhibit some characters in common, and 
not that he considered these two suborders of the Primates 
closely related. Since Mivart’s important paper on “ Lepile- 
mur and Cheirogaleus ” was written in 1878, great strides have 
been made in arranging some of the Mammals based on the 
true scientific principle of community of descent. A good ex- “ 
ample of the determination of adaptive versus essential char- 
acters is the case of the Carnivora, where the important dis- 
coveries of vertebrate paleontology clearly demonstrate that 
the Bears and Dogs are related, but the Mustelines, instead of 
being connected with the Bears, are related to the Civets. 
Again, the Hyenas came off the same stem as the Mustelines, 
and are related also to the Viverrines and not to the Cats, as 
supposed by Flower. 
Burmeister, the monographer of Tarsius, considered this ani- 
mal to be a Lemur, but with characters relating it to the Apes 
and also to the Insectivora. Burmeister’s views as to the re- 
lationship of Tarsius is shown in the following passage from 
his Memoir: “Aber Tarsius ist nicht mal ein Affe, er ist viel- 
mehr nur ein Halbaffe, ein Mitglied jener Gruppe, innerhalb 
welcher die frugivore oder zugleich omnivore Nahrung der 
hochsten Séugethiere in die ausschliesslich animalische zun- 
ächst insektivore, uberspringt.” That Burmeister fully appre 
