904 The American Naturalist. [October 
clared that man from having had four tubercles above and five below, 
would in some distant future have three above and four below. But 
he added that the theory of descent from lemurs is “ not sustained ” or 
“is premature.” This latter question is one for paleontological biolo- 
gists to decide, and Prof. Topinard did not even discuss the evidence 
from this standpoint. There is, however, good reason to suppose that 
the anthopoids (not man only) did descend from lemuroids and not 
from monkeys. Since Dr. Brinton’s article was written, Dr. Forsyth 
Major has described an extinct plistocene lemur from Madagascar 
nearly as large as a chimpanzee, with tritubercular superior molars. I 
look for future discoveries to demonstrate the truth of the lemurine 
descent of the Anthropoids, and that the monkeys (Ceropithecidae) are 
a side branch and not in the direct line. 
The descent of man from the Anthopoidsis antagonized by Virchow 
because some of the pithecoid characters of man are not prenatal, but 
only appear in later growth stages and cannot therefore be inherited 
And if he can find a mechanical cause for the character, so much the 
more certain is this conclusion in his opinion. An example of this is 
the ape-character found among various men ancient and modern, 
the platyenemic or compressed tibia. This Virchow alleges is not 
a mark of affinity to the apes, where it is universal, but that it is 
produced by a peculiar use of the muscles of the lower leg, 
especially of the anterior ones. This, however, only transfers the 
evidence from the bones to the muscles. The tibial form of the apes, 
it may be inferred, is produced in the same way as in man, and if it is 
so produced in men, we learn that in such cases the muscles and their 
use are like those of the apes. Prof. Virchow does not probably 
know, that if inheritance be believed, the entire osseous skeleton of the 
vertebrata has been moulded by the strains, pressures and impacts to 
which it has been subjected, and that these are directly or indirectly 
due to muscular contraction. The supposition that prognathism is 
not inherited from apes because it is not present in the foetus, is 
equally untenable. The change of shape of the relations of the 
cranial bones called prognathison, is common to all vertebrata, and is 
only delayed, more in apes, most in man. 
.. But Dr Brinton, like many other objectors to evidence of a plain and 
unadorned character, has his Deus ex machina. “ Genius is ever inex- 
plicable” he says. True; but the shapes of bones and teeth are not, 
and the brains of the geni tain the structural for their funct- 
ions, although we have not yet seen them. “A family of, we know not 
which of the higher mammals, perhaps, the great tree ape, which then 
ag 
