CHAPTER II.

MAN.

Ir has been calculated that life began on this earth at least some 100 millions of years ago, while man is supposed to have lived here only 100,000 years. Professor Huxley, a great authority on this subject, says "The first traces of the primordial stock whence man has proceeded need no longer be sought by those who entertain any form of the doctrine of progressive development in the newest tertiaries; but they may be looked for in an epoch more distant from the age of the Elephas primigenius than that is from

us."

Now how far it is exactly " from everlasting to everlasting" we do not know, and perhaps it would not be much less difficult to settle exactly the period here indicated-geological periods meaning only before or after certain occurrences; but we do know that millions of years, before man appeared creatures lived on this earth which exhibited most of the mental phenomena displayed by him. They may not have been quite so pretty, judged by our standard of beauty,* but they were equally fond of their wives and families and friends,

*The inhabitants of the sea depart most from our type; the walrus, the norwal, the sea devil, or the cuttle fish are certainly not beautiful. But beauty is purely subjective, and even the female toad has her lovers and admirers, who are so ardent in their affections that Dr. Günter says he has often found the lady toad dead and smothered from their too close kisses and embraces. * *

In fact, there is no accounting for taste, either in sight or sound. Darwin says: "It is a curious fact that in the same class of animals, sounds so different as the drumming of the snipe's tail, the tapping of the woodpecker's beak, the harsh trumpet-like cry of certain water-fowl, the cooing of the turtle-dove, and the song of the nightingale, should all be pleasing to the females of the several species." ("Descent of Man," vol. 2, pp. 26, 67.)

and equally provided for their support and comfort; they feasted and fought, and crowed and blustered, and spread their tails to be admired, just as men and women do now; and really, when we come to compare an Australian Savage with Horses, Dogs, and Elephants, it is the animals, we are almost inclined to think, that ought to be ashamed to own the relationship. With reference to the vast superiority upon which man prides himself, and how infinitely ridiculous he makes himself in his self-importance, we should listen to the great philosopher, Michael Faraday:-" What a weak, credulous, incredulous, unbelieving, superstitious, bold, frightened—what a ridiculons world ours is, as far as concerns the mind of man! How full of inconsistencies, contradictions, and absurdities. I declare that taking the average of many minds that have recently come before me (and apart from that spirit which God has placed in each), and accepting for a moment that average as a standard, I should far prefer the obedience, affection, and instinct of a dog before it." And who does not recollect Byron's beautiful lines:

When some proud son of man returns to earth,
Unknown to glory, but upheld by birth,
The Sculptor's art exhausts the pomp of woe,
And storied urns record who rests below;

When all is done, upon the tomb is seen,

Not what he was, but what he should have been :

But the poor dog, in life the firmest friend,

The first to welcome, the foremost to defend,
Whose honest heart is still his master's own,
Who labours, fights, lives, breathes for him alone,
Unhonour'd falls, unnoticed all his worth,
Denied in heaven the soul he held on earth:
While man, vain insect! hopes to be forgiven,
And claims himself a sole exclusive heaven.

Faraday is speaking of the Caucasian race, and not of the Mongolian, Malay, Negro, and Aboriginal American races,

EARLIEST TRACES OF MAN.

21

which at present, perhaps, comprehend five-sixths of mankind

But he who feels contempt

For any living thing, hath faculties

That he has never used.

The other sixth, the Caucasian, is much the highest type, and admits of a high degree of civilisation; and other races had probably existed on this earth many thousands of years before the yellow hair and white faces made their appearance. The most civilised claim, as Christians, the particular privilege of eternal damnation for the great majority; but we think it will be found that even they are not worth it, and that the whole plan of Creation will not be altered to suit the exigencies of their peculiar creed.

At present we have no data for fixing exactly the period of man's first appearance in the world. The Nile deposits, from which pottery has been brought up from a depth of 60 feet, and red brick from a depth of 72 feet, are calculated to represent 41,300 years, and it would be an awful bore, representing thousands of centuries, to get to the bottom of these deposits. No one has yet attempted to fix the precise date of the much-talked-of stone, or bronze periods, or of the lake dwellings; and fossil remains at present furnish very little that is definite as to time. Sir Charles Lyell is of opinion that the Engis Skull found in a cave in the valley of the Meuse is of the same age as the Mammoth and the Woolly Rhinoceros. The Neanderthal Skull is also said to belong to the same period, but no one has told us how long that is ago. In the time of flint axes and arrow heads the skulls found are small and round, with large ridges over the eyes The race was small, and, it is believed, resembled the Lapps of the present day. In the bronze age the skulls were larger and longer. The skulls of the Egyptians, preserved in their tombs and temples, closely resemble the European, but are of smaller size.

The missing link between man and his fellow-creatures has not yet been found, but one-half the earth has not yet come under observation; and it is confidently asserted that, "between the highest primate and the lowest savage, there will be no break, no chasm, but a perfect and complete series." The Orang-Outang, found only in the Islands of the Indian Seas, probably presents as high a claim as any to be man's great progenitor. He is said to be as large as a man, and very like, with a physical force equal to eight men, and he is probably a less disgusting and degraded animal than the cannibal Papuan found in his immediate vicinity. It is highly probable, however, that Man's direct progenitor is buried under the sea in the Southern Hemisphere. Mr. Darwin says:-"The Simeada branched off into two great stems, the New World and the Old World monkeys; and from the latter, at a remote period, Man, the wonder and the glory of the universe, proceeded;" the early progenitors of man being no doubt once covered with hair, both sexes having beards, their ears pointed and capable of movement, and their bodies provided with a tail having the proper muscles.*

As regards the bony structure of the body, there is the closest anatomical resemblance between man and the anthropoid apes, every tooth, every bone being strictly homologous ; but it is in the brain-the organ of the mind-that the greatest difference is found, and accordingly Professor Owen places man in a distinct sub-class of mammalia. It is not the peculiarities of mere physical form that most distinguish one animal from another, but the varied development of their nervous systems and the grades of mind dependent upon it. Thus, according to Leuret, the proportion of the brain to body is, in fishes, 1 to 5,668; in reptiles, 1 to 1,321; in birds, 1 to 212; and in mammals, 1 to 186.

The convolutions of the brains of apes, as of other animals,

*"Descent of Man," vol. 1, pp. 206, 213.

exhibit every stage of advance. The marmoset presents an almost smooth surface, while the orang has convolutions differing in appearance very little from man; the difference being more particularly in weight as compared to size of body. The lowest estimate for a healthy European brain is 32 ounces; that of a gorilla 20 ounces; while the latter is twice as heavy as any European of so small a brain. European brains have weighed 65 ounces, while the average is 42 ounces. The brain of Sir James Simpson, Edinburgh, according to the British Medical Review, was 54 ounces, and the average male brain, according to Quain and Sharpey, is 49 ounces. The European brain is much heavier than the Hindoo, hence the supremacy of the former in weight of character. A man's brain is much heavier than a woman's, the average being as 42 ounces to 34 ounces; hence the dominance of man, which is not, as is often asserted, based on law or education. The capacity of the smallest human skull is, according to Mayner, 55.3 inches; that of the largest measured by Morton contained 114 inches,-the difference between the brain of the gorilla and the smallest brain of man being much less than that between the smallest and the largest healthy human brain. The whole nervous system of a man is twice as heavy as that of a gorilla; and "already the brain of the civilised man is larger by nearly 30 per cent. than the brain of the savage.'

Idiocy results from an insufficient development of Brain; an adult male Brain being only nineteen inches in circumference necessitates mental imbecility, and all deviations from the normal shape of the Brain necessitate corresponding mental peculiarities. The circumference of the adult male. head should not be under 21 inches at least, nor over 24 inches, the tape being passed over Philoprogenitiveness' and the Perceptive Organs (usually where the hat touches.)

* H. Spencer's "Principles of Biology," vol. 2, p. 502.