9 8 
A NATURALIST ON THE PROWL. 
artificial, and have already confessed that there is some- 
thing wrong by putting on boots. It needs no argument 
to prove that in the course of time our toe-nails must 
entirely disappear. After that, I suppose, our toes will 
disappear also, or else grow together, so that our feet will 
acquire that elegant shape which fashionable shoemakers 
have already sketched out for them. Even now a European 
foot is a subject for the philosopher and moralist, not for 
the naturalist. The naturalist must occupy himself with 
what is natural. Therefore I dismiss the human toe-nail 
as irrelevant. 
Monkeys, I take it, are still within the bounds of the 
natural, though their sad and dreary eyes seem to be ever 
scanning the prospect of the next evolution. Monkeys 
have nails, and so have lemurs and all animals, I think, 
which grasp with their hands and climb trees. 
I once had a tame lemur and used often to take his 
soft hand in mine and look at his pretty nails. Like a 
monkey, he had four hands and no feet, but on the fore- 
finger of each hind hand there was a long, sharp claw 
instead of a nail. On the thumb and the other three fingers 
there were nails. This curious arrangement puzzled me 
for a long time, but there is a reason for everything, and 
