THE LIVING WORLD. 
669 
bone, temporary and permanent sets of teeth, at least two mammae, and posterior 
^part of the brain distinctly developed. As would be expected by those who 
Jiave followed the successive steps in The Living World, all of these charac¬ 
teristics are not always present in every animal and family; for the very fact 
that one class seems to shade off into another, and that we find animals classed 
variously because of their contradictions of organism, seems to us but another evi¬ 
dence of the soundness of the doctrine of evolution as a method for working, and 
the only reasonable explanation of those reversions known to occur among animals, 
as for example in the case of the wild horse of the pampas. The primates are sepa¬ 
rated into the lemurs and the anthropoids (or human-like animals), and the two 
classes are distinguished by structure, distribution, appearance and habits. The 
lemurs have free communication between the orbits of the face and the cavities, 
of the temples; at least one nail is clawed and the others are quite flat, and 
the hands and feet are large. The habitat of most of the lemurs is Madagascar, 
though one family is African. The appearance of these animals can be deferred 
until the various species pass in review; and any discussion of their habits, 
will properly find its place when the species are considered. 
Considering generally the primates, or the monkey family, we are struck 
with many curious characteristics which serve to render them anomalous, if we 
choose to regard them as occupying even a remote relation to man. We find 
them provided with four hands, by which we might conclude, by analogies, 
that they were capable of exercising the double function of hands or feet, which 
is the case; and yet while this is true, they are incapable of using their hinder- 
limbs except in conjunction with the anterior arms, and they are thus forced 
to walk on all fours. Many species of the monkey family may rise to a sitting 
posture when resting, or even walk upon the posterior limbs, but they can never 
assume an erect position. A dog may be taught to walk on its hind legs with 
quite as much ease and gracefulness as the chimpanzee, orang or gorilla, and, 
30 far as naturalness goes, one is quite as easy when upon two limbs as the 
Dther. Again, we are forced to observe the marked difference between the hand 
of the monkey and that of man. In the former we may perceive a wonderful 
adaptability, the four fingers, united to an opposable thumb, giving the power 
of firmly grasping or of picking up the smallest object; but yet it is a hand 
only by the courtesy of exaggeration, for it has all the appearance of a paw,, 
as well adapted for locomotion as for grasping. 
The nose, characteristic of the monkey family, is not always the same,, 
there being three distinct types, viz.: the flat, pointed and proboscis. In all' 
these are beheld the symbolism of the brute, also in the smallness of the eyes 
and the narrow line that separates them. Hair is not necessarily a distinguish¬ 
ing characteristic of the brute, since considerable growths have developed upon 
man, especially under circumstances of long-continued exposure to severity of 
ffimate, as nature is ever so regardful that she exerts herself to counteract 
svery unfavorable condition. Nor is the presence of a tail the special mark 
bf the brute, since man possesses a rudimentary appendage which physiologists 
designate as the coccyx. But aside from these possible similarities, observable 
only to those scientists who make a study of structure, the points at variance 
between man and monkey are not only distinct, even besides the highest 
attribute, the power to reason, but in them we see the measureless distance 
that separates man from the anthropoid. 
