IX. SOME PRIMITIVE THEORIES OF THE ORIGIN OF MAN.

By J.G. FRAZER. Fellow of Trinity College, Cambridge.

On a bright day in late autumn a good many years ago I had ascended the

hill of Panopeus in Phocis to examine the ancient Greek fortifications

which crest its brow. It was the first of November, but the weather was

very hot; and when my work among the ruins was done, I was glad to

rest under the shade of a clump of fine holly-oaks, to inhale the sweet

refreshing perfume of the wild thyme which scented all the air, and

to enjoy the distant prospects, rich in natural beauty, rich too in

memories of the legendary and historic past. To the south the finely-cut

peak of Helicon peered over the low intervening hills. In the west

loomed the mighty mass of Parnassus, its middle slopes darkened by

pine-woods like shadows of clouds brooding on the mountain-side; while

at its skirts nestled the ivy-mantled walls of Daulis overhanging the

deep glen, whose romantic beauty accords so well with the loves and

sorrows of Procne and Philomela, which Greek tradition associated

with the spot. Northwards, across the broad plain to which the hill

of Panopeus descends, steep and bare, the eye rested on the gap in the

hills through which the Cephissus winds his tortuous way to flow under

grey willows, at the foot of barren stony hills, till his turbid waters

lose themselves, no longer in the vast reedy swamps of the now vanished

Copaic Lake, but in the darkness of a cavern in the limestone rock.

Eastward, clinging to the slopes of the bleak range of which the hill

of Panopeus forms part, were the ruins of Chaeronea, the birthplace of

Plutarch; and out there in the plain was fought the disastrous battle

which laid Greece at the feet of Macedonia. There, too, in a later age

East and West met in deadly conflict, when the Roman armies under Sulla

defeated the Asiatic hosts of Mithridates. Such was the landscape spread

out before me on one of those farewell autumn days of almost pathetic

splendour, when the departing summer seems to linger fondly, as if loth

to resign to winter the enchanted mountains of Greece. Next day the

scene had changed: summer was gone. A grey November mist hung low on the

hills which only yesterday had shone resplendent in the sun, and under

its melancholy curtain the dead flat of the Chaeronean plain, a wide

treeless expanse shut in by desolate slopes, wore an aspect of chilly

sadness befitting the battlefield where a nation's freedom was lost.

But crowded as the prospect from Panopeus is with memories of the past,

the place itself, now so still and deserted, was once the scene of an

event even more ancient and memorable, if Greek story-tellers can be

trusted. For here, they say, the sage Prometheus created our first

parents by fashioning them, like a potter, out of clay. (Pausanias X.

4.4. Compare Apollodorus, "Bibliotheca", I. 7. 1; Ovid, "Metamorph."

I. 82 sq.; Juvenal, "Sat". XIV. 35. According to another version of

the tale, this creation of mankind took place not at Panopeus, but

at Iconium in Lycaonia. After the original race of mankind had been

destroyed in the great flood of Deucalion, the Greek Noah, Zeus

commanded Prometheus and Athena to create men afresh by moulding images

out of clay, breathing the winds into them, and making them live. See

"Etymologicum Magnum", s.v. "'Ikonion", pages 470 sq. It is said that

Prometheus fashioned the animals as well as men, giving to each kind of

beast its proper nature. See Philemon, quoted by Stobaeus, "Florilegium"

II. 27. The creation of man by Prometheus is figured on ancient works of

art. See J. Toutain, "Etudes de Mythologie et d'Histoire des Religions

Antiques" (Paris, 1909), page 190. According to Hesiod ("Works and

Days", 60 sqq.) it was Hephaestus who at the bidding of Zeus moulded the

first woman out of moist earth.) The very spot where he did so can still

be seen. It is a forlorn little glen or rather hollow behind the hill

of Panopeus, below the ruined but still stately walls and towers which

crown the grey rocks of the summit. The glen, when I visited it that hot

day after the long drought of summer, was quite dry; no water trickled

down its bushy sides, but in the bottom I found a reddish crumbling

earth, a relic perhaps of the clay out of which the potter Prometheus

moulded the Greek Adam and Eve. In a volume dedicated to the honour of

one who has done more than any other in modern times to shape the ideas

of mankind as to their origin it may not be out of place to recall this

crude Greek notion of the creation of the human race, and to compare or

contrast it with other rudimentary speculations of primitive peoples

on the same subject, if only for the sake of marking the interval which

divides the childhood from the maturity of science.

The simple notion that the first man and woman were modelled out of clay

by a god or other superhuman being is found in the traditions of many

peoples. This is the Hebrew belief recorded in Genesis: "The Lord God

formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the

breath of life; and man became a living soul." (Genesis ii.7.) To the

Hebrews this derivation of our species suggested itself all the more

naturally because in their language the word for "ground" (adamah) is

in form the feminine of the word for man (adam). (S.R. Driver and

W.H.Bennett, in their commentaries on Genesis ii. 7.) From various

allusions in Babylonian literature it would seem that the Babylonians

also conceived man to have been moulded out of clay. (H. Zimmern, in E.

Schrader's "Die Keilinschriften und das Alte Testament" 3 (Berlin, 1902),

page 506.) According to Berosus, the Babylonian priest whose account of

creation has been preserved in a Greek version, the god Bel cut off his

own head, and the other gods caught the flowing blood, mixed it with

earth, and fashioned men out of the bloody paste; and that, they said,

is why men are so wise, because their mortal clay is tempered with

divine blood. (Eusebius, "Chronicon", ed. A. Schoene, Vol. I. (Berlin,

1875), col. 16.) In Egyptian mythology Khnoumou, the Father of the gods,

is said to have moulded men out of clay. (G. Maspero, "Histoire Ancienne

des Peuples de l'Orient Classique", I. (Paris, 1895), page 128.) We

cannot doubt that such crude conceptions of the origin of our race were

handed down to the civilised peoples of antiquity by their savage or

barbarous forefathers. Certainly stories of the same sort are known to

be current among savages and barbarians.

Thus the Australian blacks in the neighbourhood of Melbourne said that

Pund-jel, the creator, cut three large sheets of bark with his big

knife. On one of these he placed some clay and worked it up with his

knife into a proper consistence. He then laid a portion of the clay on

one of the other pieces of bark and shaped it into a human form; first

he made the feet, then the legs, then the trunk, the arms, and the head.

Thus he made a clay man on each of the two pieces of bark; and being

well pleased with them he danced round them for joy. Next he took

stringy bark from the Eucalyptus tree, made hair of it, and stuck it

on the heads of his clay men. Then he looked at them again, was pleased

with his work, and again danced round them for joy. He then lay down

on them, blew his breath hard into their mouths, their noses, and their

navels; and presently they stirred, spoke, and rose up as full-grown

men. (R. Brough Smyth, "The Aborigines of Victoria" (Melbourne, 1878),

I. 424. This and many of the following legends of creation have been

already cited by me in a note on Pausanias X. 4. 4 ("Pausanias's

Description of Greece, translated with a Commentary" (London, 1898),

Vol V. pages 220 sq.).) The Maoris of New Zealand say that Tiki made man

after his own image. He took red clay, kneaded it, like the Babylonian

Bel, with his own blood, fashioned it in human form, and gave the image

breath. As he had made man in his own likeness he called him Tiki-ahua

or Tiki's likeness. (R. Taylor "Te Ika A Maui, or New Zealand and

its Inhabitants", Second Edition (London, 1870), page 117. Compare E.

Shortland, "Maori Religion and Mythology" (London, 1882), pages 21 sq.)

A very generally received tradition in Tahiti was that the first human

pair was made by Taaroa, the chief god. They say that after he had

formed the world he created man out of red earth, which was also the

food of mankind until bread-fruit was produced. Further, some say that

one day Taaroa called for the man by name, and when he came he made him

fall asleep. As he slept, the creator took out one of his bones (ivi)

and made a woman of it, whom he gave to the man to be his wife, and the

pair became the progenitors of mankind. This narrative was taken down

from the lips of the natives in the early years of the mission to

Tahiti. The missionary who records it observes: "This always appeared

to me a mere recital of the Mosaic account of creation, which they

had heard from some European, and I never placed any reliance on it,

although they have repeatedly told me it was a tradition among them

before any foreigner arrived. Some have also stated that the woman's

name was Ivi, which would be by them pronounced as if written "Eve".

"Ivi" is an aboriginal word, and not only signifies a bone, but also a

widow, and a victim slain in war. Notwithstanding the assertion of

the natives, I am disposed to think that "Ivi", or Eve, is the only

aboriginal part of the story, as far as it respects the mother of the

human race. (W. Ellis, "Polynesian Researches", Second Edition (London,

1832), I. 110 sq. "Ivi" or "iwi" is the regular word for "bone" in the

various Polynesian languages. See E. Tregear, "The Maori-Polynesian

Comparative Dictionary" (Wellington, New Zealand, 1891), page 109.)

However, the same tradition has been recorded in other parts of

Polynesia besides Tahiti. Thus the natives of Fakaofo or Bowditch Island

say that the first man was produced out of a stone. After a time he

bethought him of making a woman. So he gathered earth and moulded the

figure of a woman out of it, and having done so he took a rib out of his

left side and thrust it into the earthen figure, which thereupon started

up a live woman. He called her Ivi (Eevee) or "rib" and took her to

wife, and the whole human race sprang from this pair. (G. Turner,

"Samoa" (London, 1884), pages 267 sq.) The Maoris also are reported to

believe that the first woman was made out of the first man's ribs. (J.L.

Nicholas, "Narrative of a Voyage to New Zealand" (London, 1817), I.

59, who writes "and to add still more to this strange coincidence, the

general term for bone is 'Hevee'.") This wide diffusion of the story

in Polynesia raises a doubt whether it is merely, as Ellis thought, a

repetition of the Biblical narrative learned from Europeans. In Nui, or

Netherland Island, it was the god Aulialia who made earthen models of

a man and woman, raised them up, and made them live. He called the man

Tepapa and the woman Tetata. (G. Turner, "Samoa", pages 300 sq.)

In the Pelew Islands they say that a brother and sister made men out of

clay kneaded with the blood of various animals, and that the characters

of these first men and of their descendants were determined by the

characters of the animals whose blood had been kneaded with the

primordial clay; for instance, men who have rat's blood in them are

thieves, men who have serpent's blood in them are sneaks, and men who

have cock's blood in them are brave. (J. Kubary, "Die Religion der

Pelauer", in A. Bastian's "Allerlei aus Volks- und Menschenkunde"

(Berlin, 1888), I. 3, 56.) According to a Melanesian legend, told in

Mota, one of the Banks Islands, the hero Qat moulded men of clay, the

red clay from the marshy river-side at Vanua Lava. At first he made men

and pigs just alike, but his brothers remonstrated with him, so he

beat down the pigs to go on all fours and made men walk upright. Qat

fashioned the first woman out of supple twigs, and when she smiled

he knew she was a living woman. (R.H. Codrington, "The Melanesians"

(Oxford, 1891), page 158.) A somewhat different version of the

Melanesian story is told at Lakona, in Santa Maria. There they say that

Qat and another spirit ("vui") called Marawa both made men. Qat made

them out of the wood of dracaena-trees. Six days he worked at them,

carving their limbs and fitting them together. Then he allowed them six

days to come to life. Three days he hid them away, and three days more

he worked to make them live. He set them up and danced to them and beat

his drum, and little by little they stirred, till at last they could

stand all by themselves. Then Qat divided them into pairs and called

each pair husband and wife. Marawa also made men out of a tree, but it

was a different tree, the tavisoviso. He likewise worked at them six

days, beat his drum, and made them live, just as Qat did. But when he

saw them move, he dug a pit and buried them in it for six days, and

then, when he scraped away the earth to see what they were doing, he

found them all rotten and stinking. That was the origin of death. (R.H.

Codrington op. cit., pages 157 sq.)

The inhabitants of Noo-Hoo-roa, in the Kei Islands say that their

ancestors were fashioned out of clay by the supreme god, Dooadlera,

who breathed life into the clay figures. (C.M. Pleyte, "Ethnographische

Beschrijving der Kei-Eilanden", "Tijdschrift van het Nederlandsch

Aardrijkskundig Genootschap", Tweede Serie X. (1893), page 564.) The

aborigines of Minahassa, in the north of Celebes, say that two beings

called Wailan Wangko and Wangi were alone on an island, on which grew

a cocoa-nut tree. Said Wailan Wangko to Wangi, "Remain on earth while

I climb up the tree." Said Wangi to Wailan Wangko, "Good." But then

a thought occurred to Wangi and he climbed up the tree to ask Wailan

Wangko why he, Wangi, should remain down there all alone. Said Wailan

Wangko to Wangi, "Return and take earth and make two images, a man and a

woman." Wangi did so, and both images were men who could move but could

not speak. So Wangi climbed up the tree to ask Wailan Wangko, "How now?

The two images are made, but they cannot speak." Said Wailan Wangko to

Wangi, "Take this ginger and go and blow it on the skulls and the ears

of these two images, that they may be able to speak; call the man Adam

and the woman Ewa." (N. Graafland "De Minahassa" (Rotterdam, 1869), I.

pages 96 sq.) In this narrative the names of the man and woman betray

European influence, but the rest of the story may be aboriginal. The

Dyaks of Sakarran in British Borneo say that the first man was made by

two large birds. At first they tried to make men out of trees, but

in vain. Then they hewed them out of rocks, but the figures could not

speak. Then they moulded a man out of damp earth and infused into his

veins the red gum of the kumpang-tree. After that they called to him and

he answered; they cut him and blood flowed from his wounds. (Horsburgh,

quoted by H. Ling Roth, "The Natives of Sarawak and of British North

Borneo" (London, 1896), I. pages 299 sq. Compare The Lord Bishop

of Labuan, "On the Wild Tribes of the North-West Coast of Borneo,"

"Transactions of the Ethnological Society of London", New Series, II.

(1863), page 27.)

The Kumis of South-Eastern India related to Captain Lewin, the Deputy

Commissioner of Hill Tracts, the following tradition of the creation of

man. "God made the world and the trees and the creeping things first,

and after that he set to work to make one man and one woman, forming

their bodies of clay; but each night, on the completion of his work,

there came a great snake, which, while God was sleeping, devoured the

two images. This happened twice or thrice, and God was at his wit's end,

for he had to work all day, and could not finish the pair in less than

twelve hours; besides, if he did not sleep, he would be no good," said

Captain Lewin's informant. "If he were not obliged to sleep, there would

be no death, nor would mankind be afflicted with illness. It is when

he rests that the snake carries us off to this day. Well, he was at his

wit's end, so at last he got up early one morning and first made a dog

and put life into it, and that night, when he had finished the images,

he set the dog to watch them, and when the snake came, the dog barked

and frightened it away. This is the reason at this day that when a

man is dying the dogs begin to howl; but I suppose God sleeps heavily

now-a-days, or the snake is bolder, for men die all the same." (Capt.

T.H. Lewin, "Wild Races of South-Eastern India" (London, 1870),

pages 224-26.) The Khasis of Assam tell a similar tale. (A. Bastian,

"Volkerstamme am Brahmaputra und verwandtschaftliche Nachbarn" (Berlin,

1883), page 8; Major P.R.T. Gurdon, "The Khasis" (London, 1907), page

106.)

The Ewe-speaking tribes of Togo-land, in West Africa, think that God

still makes men out of clay. When a little of the water with which he

moistens the clay remains over, he pours it on the ground and out of

that he makes the bad and disobedient people. When he wishes to make a

good man he makes him out of good clay; but when he wishes to make a

bad man, he employs only bad clay for the purpose. In the beginning

God fashioned a man and set him on the earth; after that he fashioned

a woman. The two looked at each other and began to laugh, whereupon

God sent them into the world. (J. Spieth, "Die Ewe-Stamme, Material zur

Kunde des Ewe-Volkes in Deutsch-Togo" (Berlin, 1906), pages 828, 840.)

The Innuit or Esquimaux of Point Barrow, in Alaska, tell of a time when

there was no man in the land, till a spirit named "a se lu", who resided

at Point Barrow, made a clay man, set him up on the shore to dry,

breathed into him and gave him life. ("Report of the International

Expedition to Point Barrow" (Washington, 1885), page 47.) Other

Esquimaux of Alaska relate how the Raven made the first woman out of

clay to be a companion to the first man; he fastened water-grass to the

back of the head to be hair, flapped his wings over the clay figure,

and it arose, a beautiful young woman. (E.W. Nelson, "The Eskimo about

Bering Strait", "Eighteenth Annual Report of the Bureau of American

Ethnology", Part I. (Washington, 1899), page 454.) The Acagchemem

Indians of California said that a powerful being called Chinigchinich

created man out of clay which he found on the banks of a lake; male and

female created he them, and the Indians of the present day are their

descendants. (Friar Geronimo Boscana, "Chinigchinich", appended to (A.

Robinson's) "Life in California" (New York, 1846), page 247.) A priest

of the Natchez Indians in Louisiana told Du Pratz "that God had kneaded

some clay, such as that which potters use and had made it into a little

man; and that after examining it, and finding it well formed, he blew up

his work, and forthwith that little man had life, grew, acted, walked,

and found himself a man perfectly well shaped." As to the mode in which

the first woman was created, the priest had no information, but thought

she was probably made in the same way as the first man; so Du Pratz

corrected his imperfect notions by reference to Scripture. (M. Le Page

Du Pratz, "The History of Louisiana" (London, 1774), page 330.) The

Michoacans of Mexico said that the great god Tucapacha first made man

and woman out of clay, but that when the couple went to bathe in a river

they absorbed so much water that the clay of which they were composed

all fell to pieces. Then the creator went to work again and moulded them

afresh out of ashes, and after that he essayed a third time and made

them of metal. This last attempt succeeded. The metal man and woman

bathed in the river without falling to pieces, and by their union they

became the progenitors of mankind. (A. de Herrera, "General History of

the vast Continent and Islands of America", translated into English by

Capt. J. Stevens (London, 1725, 1726), III. 254; Brasseur de Bourbourg,

"Histoire des Nations Civilisees du Mexique et de l'Amerique-Centrale"

(Paris, 1857--1859), III. 80 sq; compare id. I. 54 sq.)

According to a legend of the Peruvian Indians, which was told to a

Spanish priest in Cuzco about half a century after the conquest, it was

in Tiahuanaco that man was first created, or at least was created afresh

after the deluge. "There (in Tiahuanaco)," so runs the legend, "the

Creator began to raise up the people and nations that are in that

region, making one of each nation of clay, and painting the dresses that

each one was to wear; those that were to wear their hair, with hair, and

those that were to be shorn, with hair cut. And to each nation was given

the language, that was to be spoken, and the songs to be sung, and the

seeds and food that they were to sow. When the Creator had finished

painting and making the said nations and figures of clay, he gave life

and soul to each one, as well men as women, and ordered that they should

pass under the earth. Thence each nation came up in the places to which

he ordered them to go." (E.J. Payne, "History of the New World called

America", I. (Oxford, 1892), page 462.)

These examples suffice to prove that the theory of the creation of man

out of dust or clay has been current among savages in many parts of

the world. But it is by no means the only explanation which the savage

philosopher has given of the beginnings of human life on earth. Struck

by the resemblances which may be traced between himself and the beasts,

he has often supposed, like Darwin himself, that mankind has been

developed out of lower forms of animal life. For the simple savage has

none of that high notion of the transcendant dignity of man which makes

so many superior persons shrink with horror from the suggestion that

they are distant cousins of the brutes. He on the contrary is not too

proud to own his humble relations; indeed his difficulty often is

to perceive the distinction between him and them. Questioned by a

missionary, a Bushman of more than average intelligence "could not state

any difference between a man and a brute--he did not know but a buffalo

might shoot with bows and arrows as well as man, if it had them."

(Reverend John Campbell, "Travels in South Africa" (London, 1822, II.

page 34.) When the Russians first landed on one of the Alaskan islands,

the natives took them for cuttle-fish "on account of the buttons on

their clothes." (I. Petroff, "Report on the Population, Industries, and

Resources of Alaska", page 145.) The Giliaks of the Amoor think that the

outward form and size of an animal are only apparent; in substance every

beast is a real man, just like a Giliak himself, only endowed with an

intelligence and strength, which often surpass those of mere ordinary

human beings. (L. Sternberg, "Die Religion der Giljaken", "Archiv fur

Religionswissenschaft", VIII. (1905), page 248.) The Borororos, an

Indian tribe of Brazil, will have it that they are parrots of a gorgeous

red plumage which live in their native forests. Accordingly they treat

the birds as their fellow-tribesmen, keeping them in captivity, refusing

to eat their flesh, and mourning for them when they die. (K. von den

Steinen, "Unter den Naturvolkern Zentral-Brasiliens" (Berlin, 1894),

pages 352 sq., 512.))

This sense of the close relationship of man to the lower creation is the

essence of totemism, that curious system of superstition which unites

by a mystic bond a group of human kinsfolk to a species of animals or

plants. Where that system exists in full force, the members of a totem

clan identify themselves with their totem animals in a way and to an

extent which we find it hard even to imagine. For example, men of the

Cassowary clan in Mabuiag think that cassowaries are men or nearly so.

"Cassowary, he all same as relation, he belong same family," is the

account they give of their relationship with the long-legged bird.

Conversely they hold that they themselves are cassowaries for all

practical purposes. They pride themselves on having long thin legs like

a cassowary. This reflection affords them peculiar satisfaction when

they go out to fight, or to run away, as the case may be; for at such

times a Cassowary man will say to himself, "My leg is long and thin, I

can run and not feel tired; my legs will go quickly and the grass will

not entangle them." Members of the Cassowary clan are reputed to be

pugnacious, because the cassowary is a bird of very uncertain temper and

can kick with extreme violence. (A.C. Haddon, "The Ethnography of

the Western Tribe of Torres Straits", "Journal of the Anthropological

Institute", XIX. (1890), page 393; "Reports of the Cambridge

Anthropological Expedition to Torres Straits", V. (Cambridge, 1904),

pages 166, 184.) So among the Ojibways men of the Bear clan are reputed

to be surly and pugnacious like bears, and men of the Crane clan to

have clear ringing voices like cranes. (W.W. Warren, "History of the

Ojibways", "Collections of the Minnesota Historical Society", V. (Saint

Paul, Minn. 1885), pages 47, 49.) Hence the savage will often speak of

his totem animal as his father or his brother, and will neither kill it

himself nor allow others to do so, if he can help it. For example, if

somebody were to kill a bird in the presence of a native Australian who

had the bird for his totem, the black might say, "What for you kill

that fellow? that my father!" or "That brother belonging to me you

have killed; why did you do it?" (E. Palmer, "Notes on some Australian

Tribes", "Journal of the Anthropological Institute", XIII. (1884), page

300.) Bechuanas of the Porcupine clan are greatly afflicted if anybody

hurts or kills a porcupine in their presence. They say, "They have

killed our brother, our master, one of ourselves, him whom we sing of";

and so saying they piously gather the quills of their murdered brother,

spit on them, and rub their eyebrows with them. They think they would

die if they touched its flesh. In like manner Bechuanas of the Crocodile

clan call the crocodile one of themselves, their master, their

brother; and they mark the ears of their cattle with a long slit like a

crocodile's mouth by way of a family crest. Similarly Bechuanas of the

Lion clan would not, like the members of other clans, partake of lion's

flesh; for how, say they, could they eat their grandfather? If they are

forced in self-defence to kill a lion, they do so with great regret and

rub their eyes carefully with its skin, fearing to lose their sight if

they neglected this precaution. (T. Arbousset et F. Daumas, "Relation

d'un Voyage d'Exploration au Nord-Est de la Colonie du Cap de

Bonne-Esperance" (Paris, 1842), pages 349 sq., 422-24.) A Mandingo

porter has been known to offer the whole of his month's pay to save

the life of a python, because the python was his totem and he therefore

regarded the reptile as his relation; he thought that if he allowed

the creature to be killed, the whole of his own family would perish,

probably through the vengeance to be taken by the reptile kinsfolk of

the murdered serpent. (M. le Docteur Tautain, "Notes sur les Croyances

et Pratiques Religieuses des Banmanas", "Revue d'Ethnographie",

III. (1885), pages 396 sq.; A. Rancon, "Dans la Haute-Gambie, Voyage

d'Exploration Scientifique" (Paris, 1894), page 445.)

Sometimes, indeed, the savage goes further and identifies the revered

animal not merely with a kinsman but with himself; he imagines that one

of his own more or less numerous souls, or at all events that a vital

part of himself, is in the beast, so that if it is killed he must die.

Thus, the Balong tribe of the Cameroons, in West Africa, think that

every man has several souls, of which one is lodged in an elephant, a

wild boar, a leopard, or what not. When any one comes home, feels ill,

and says, "I shall soon die," and is as good as his word, his friends

are of opinion that one of his souls has been shot by a hunter in a wild

boar or a leopard, for example, and that that is the real cause of his

death. (J. Keller, "Ueber das Land und Volk der Balong", "Deutsches

Kolonialblatt", 1 October, 1895, page 484.) A Catholic missionary,

sleeping in the hut of a chief of the Fan negroes, awoke in the middle

of the night to see a huge black serpent of the most dangerous sort

in the act of darting at him. He was about to shoot it when the chief

stopped him, saying, "In killing that serpent, it is me that you would

have killed. Fear nothing, the serpent is my elangela." (Father Trilles,

"Chez les Fang, leurs Moeurs, leur Langue, leur Religion", "Les Missions

Catholiques", XXX. (1898), page 322.) At Calabar there used to be some

years ago a huge old crocodile which was well known to contain the

spirit of a chief who resided in the flesh at Duke Town. Sporting

Vice-Consuls, with a reckless disregard of human life, from time to time

made determined attempts to injure the animal, and once a peculiarly

active officer succeeded in hitting it. The chief was immediately laid

up with a wound in his leg. He SAID that a dog had bitten him, but

few people perhaps were deceived by so flimsy a pretext. (Miss Mary H.

Kingsley, "Travels in West Africa" (London, 1897), pages 538 sq. As to

the external or bush souls of human beings, which in this part of Africa

are supposed to be lodged in the bodies of animals, see Miss Mary H.

Kingsley op. cit. pages 459-461; R. Henshaw, "Notes on the Efik belief

in 'bush soul'", "Man", VI.(1906), pages 121 sq.; J. Parkinson,

"Notes on the Asaba people (Ibos) of the Niger", "Journal of the

Anthropological Institute", XXXVI. (1906), pages 314 sq.) Once when Mr

Partridge's canoe-men were about to catch fish near an Assiga town in

Southern Nigeria, the natives of the town objected, saying, "Our

souls live in those fish, and if you kill them we shall die." (Charles

Partridge, "Cross River Natives" (London, 1905), pages 225 sq.) On

another occasion, in the same region, an Englishman shot a hippopotamus

near a native village. The same night a woman died in the village,

and her friends demanded and obtained from the marksman five pounds as

compensation for the murder of the woman, whose soul or second self had

been in that hippopotamus. (C.H. Robinson, "Hausaland" (London, 1896),

pages 36 sq.) Similarly at Ndolo, in the Congo region, we hear of a

chief whose life was bound up with a hippopotamus, but he prudently

suffered no one to fire at the animal. ("Notes Analytiques sur les

Collections Ethnographiques du Musee du Congo", I. (Brussels, 1902-06),

page 150.)

Amongst people who thus fail to perceive any sharp line of distinction

between beasts and men it is not surprising to meet with the belief that

human beings are directly descended from animals. Such a belief is often

found among totemic tribes who imagine that their ancestors sprang from

their totemic animals or plants; but it is by no means confined to

them. Thus, to take instances, some of the Californian Indians, in whose

mythology the coyote or prairie-wolf is a leading personage, think that

they are descended from coyotes. At first they walked on all fours; then

they began to have some members of the human body, one finger, one toe,

one eye, one ear, and so on; then they got two fingers, two toes, two

eyes, two ears, and so forth; till at last, progressing from period to

period, they became perfect human beings. The loss of their tails, which

they still deplore, was produced by the habit of sitting upright. (H.R.

Schoolcraft, "Indian Tribes of the United States", IV. (Philadelphia,

1856), pages 224 sq.; compare id. V. page 217. The descent of some, not

all, Indians from coyotes is mentioned also by Friar Boscana, in (A.

Robinson's) "Life in California" (New York, 1846), page 299.)

Similarly Darwin thought that "the tail has disappeared in man and the

anthropomorphous apes, owing to the terminal portion having been injured

by friction during a long lapse of time; the basal and embedded portion

having been reduced and modified, so as to become suitable to the erect

or semi-erect position." (Charles Darwin, "The Descent of Man", Second

Edition (London, 1879), page 60.) The Turtle clam of the Iroquois think

that they are descended from real mud turtles which used to live in a

pool. One hot summer the pool dried up, and the mud turtles set out to

find another. A very fat turtle, waddling after the rest in the heat,

was much incommoded by the weight of his shell, till by a great effort

he heaved it off altogether. After that he gradually developed into a

man and became the progenitor of the Turtle clan. (E.A. Smith, "Myths

of the Iroquois", "Second Annual Report of the Bureau of Ethnology"

(Washington, 1883), page 77.) The Crawfish band of the Choctaws are

in like manner descended from real crawfish, which used to live under

ground, only coming up occasionally through the mud to the surface. Once

a party of Choctaws smoked them out, taught them the Choctaw language,

taught them to walk on two legs, made them cut off their toe nails and

pluck the hair from their bodies, after which they adopted them into the

tribe. But the rest of their kindred, the crawfish, are crawfish under

ground to this day. (Geo. Catlin, "North American Indians" 4 (London,

1844), II. page 128.) The Osage Indians universally believed that they

were descended from a male snail and a female beaver. A flood swept the

snail down to the Missouri and left him high and dry on the bank, where

the sun ripened him into a man. He met and married a beaver maid, and

from the pair the tribe of the Osages is descended. For a long time

these Indians retained a pious reverence for their animal ancestors and

refrained from hunting beavers, because in killing a beaver they killed

a brother of the Osages. But when white men came among them and offered

high prices for beaver skins, the Osages yielded to the temptation and

took the lives of their furry brethren. (Lewis and Clarke, "Travels to

the Source of the Missouri River" (London, 1815), I. 12 (Vol. I. pages

44 sq. of the London reprint, 1905).) The Carp clan of the Ootawak

Indians are descended from the eggs of a carp which had been deposited

by the fish on the banks of a stream and warmed by the sun. ("Lettres

Edifiantes et Curieuses", Nouvelle Edition, VI. (Paris, 1781), page

171.) The Crane clan of the Ojibways are sprung originally from a pair

of cranes, which after long wanderings settled on the rapids at the

outlet of Lake Superior, where they were changed by the Great Spirit

into a man and woman. (L.H. Morgan, "Ancient Society" (London, 1877),

page 180.) The members of two Omaha clans were originally buffaloes and

lived, oddly enough, under water, which they splashed about, making it

muddy. And at death all the members of these clans went back to their

ancestors the buffaloes. So when one of them lay adying, his friends

used to wrap him up in a buffalo skin with the hair outside and say to

him, "You came hither from the animals and you are going back thither.

Do not face this way again. When you go, continue walking. (J. Owen

Dorsey, "Omaha Sociology", "Third Annual Report of the Bureau of

Ethnology" (Washington, 1884), pages 229, 233.) The Haida Indians of

Queen Charlotte Islands believe that long ago the raven, who is the

chief figure in the mythology of North-West America, took a cockle from

the beach and married it; the cockle gave birth to a female child, whom

the raven took to wife, and from their union the Indians were produced.

(G.M. Dawson, "Report on the Queen Charlotte Islands" (Montreal,

1880), pages 149B sq. ("Geological Survey of Canada"); F. Poole,

"Queen Charlotte Islands", page 136.) The Delaware Indians called the

rattle-snake their grandfather and would on no account destroy one of

these reptiles, believing that were they to do so the whole race of

rattle-snakes would rise up and bite them. Under the influence of the

white man, however, their respect for their grandfather the rattle-snake

gradually died away, till at last they killed him without compunction

or ceremony whenever they met him. The writer who records the old custom

observes that he had often reflected on the curious connection which

appears to subsist in the mind of an Indian between man and the brute

creation; "all animated nature," says he, "in whatever degree, is in

their eyes a great whole, from which they have not yet ventured to

separate themselves." (Rev. John Heckewelder, "An Account of the

History, Manners, and Customs, of the Indian Nations, who once inhabited

Pennsylvania and the Neighbouring States", "Transactions of the

Historical and Literary Committee of the American Philosophical

Society", I. (Philadelphia, 1819), pages 245, 247, 248.)

Some of the Indians of Peru boasted of being descended from the puma

or American lion; hence they adored the lion as a god and appeared at

festivals like Hercules dressed in the skins of lions with the heads

of the beasts fixed over their own. Others claimed to be sprung from

condors and attired themselves in great black and white wings, like

that enormous bird. (Garcilasso de la Vega, "First Part of the Royal

Commentaries of the Yncas", Vol. I. page 323, Vol. II. page 156

(Markham's translation).) The Wanika of East Africa look upon the hyaena

as one of their ancestors or as associated in some way with their origin

and destiny. The death of a hyaena is mourned by the whole people, and

the greatest funeral ceremonies which they perform are performed for

this brute. The wake held over a chief is as nothing compared to the

wake held over a hyaena; one tribe only mourns the death of its chief,

but all the tribes unite to celebrate the obsequies of a hyaena.

(Charles New, "Life, Wanderings, and Labours in Eastern Africa" (London,

1873) page 122.) Some Malagasy families claim to be descended from the

babacoote (Lichanotus brevicaudatus), a large lemur of grave appearance

and staid demeanour, which lives in the depth of the forest. When

they find one of these creatures dead, his human descendants bury it

solemnly, digging a grave for it, wrapping it in a shroud, and weeping

and lamenting over its carcase. A doctor who had shot a babacoote was

accused by the inhabitants of a Betsimisaraka village of having

killed "one of their grandfathers in the forest," and to appease their

indignation he had to promise not to skin the animal in the village

but in a solitary place where nobody could see him. (Father Abinal,

"Croyances fabuleuses des Malgaches", "Les Missions Catholiques", XII.

(1880), page 526; G.H. Smith, "Some Betsimisaraka superstitions", "The

Antananarivo Annual and Madagascar Magazine", No. 10 (Antananarivo,

1886), page 239; H.W. Little, "Madagascar, its History and People"

(London, 1884), pages 321 sq; A. van Gennep, "Tabou et Totemisme a

Madagascar" (Paris, 1904), pages 214 sqq.) Many of the Betsimisaraka

believe that the curious nocturnal animal called the aye-aye (Cheiromys

madagascariensis) "is the embodiment of their forefathers, and hence

will not touch it, much less do it an injury. It is said that when one

is discovered dead in the forest, these people make a tomb for it and

bury it with all the forms of a funeral. They think that if they attempt

to entrap it, they will surely die in consequence." (G.A. Shaw, "The

Aye-aye", "Antananarivo Annual and Madagascar Magazine", Vol. II.

(Antananarivo, 1896), pages 201, 203 (Reprint of the Second four

Numbers). Compare A. van Gennep, "Tabou et Totemisme a Madagascar",

pages 223 sq.) Some Malagasy tribes believe themselves descended from

crocodiles and accordingly they deem the formidable reptiles their

brothers. If one of these scaly brothers so far forgets the ties of

kinship as to devour a man, the chief of the tribe, or in his absence

an old man familiar with the tribal customs, repairs at the head of the

people to the edge of the water, and summons the family of the culprit

to deliver him up to the arm of justice. A hook is then baited and cast

into the river or lake. Next day the guilty brother or one of his family

is dragged ashore, formally tried, sentenced to death, and executed. The

claims of justice being thus satisfied, the dead animal is lamented

and buried like a kinsman; a mound is raised over his grave and a stone

marks the place of his head. (Father Abinal, "Croyances fabuleuses des

Malgaches", "Les Missions Catholiques", XII. (1880), page 527; A. van

Gennep, "Tabou et Totemisme a Madagascar", pages 281 sq.)

Amongst the Tshi-speaking tribes of the Gold Coast in West Africa the

Horse-mackerel family traces its descent from a real horse-mackerel whom

an ancestor of theirs once took to wife. She lived with him happily

in human shape on shore till one day a second wife, whom the man had

married, cruelly taunted her with being nothing but a fish. That hurt

her so much that bidding her husband farewell she returned to her old

home in the sea, with her youngest child in her arms, and never came

back again. But ever since the Horse-mackerel people have refrained from

eating horse-mackerels, because the lost wife and mother was a fish of

that sort. (A.B. Ellis, "The Tshi-speaking Peoples of the Gold Coast

of West Africa" (London, 1887), pages 208-11. A similar tale is told by

another fish family who abstain from eating the fish (appei) from which

they take their name (A.B. Ellis op. cit. pages 211 sq.).) Some of the

Land Dyaks of Borneo tell a similar tale to explain a similar custom.

"There is a fish which is taken in their rivers called a puttin, which

they would on no account touch, under the idea that if they did they

would be eating their relations. The tradition respecting it is, that a

solitary old man went out fishing and caught a puttin, which he dragged

out of the water and laid down in his boat. On turning round, he found

it had changed into a very pretty little girl. Conceiving the idea she

would make, what he had long wished for, a charming wife for his son,

he took her home and educated her until she was fit to be married. She

consented to be the son's wife cautioning her husband to use her well.

Some time after their marriage, however, being out of temper, he struck

her, when she screamed, and rushed away into the water; but not without

leaving behind her a beautiful daughter, who became afterwards the

mother of the race." (The Lord Bishop of Labuan, "On the Wild Tribes

of the North-West Coast of Borneo", "Transactions of the Ethnological

Society of London", New Series II. (London, 1863), pages 26 sq. Such

stories conform to a well-known type which may be called the Swan-Maiden

type of story, or Beauty and the Beast, or Cupid and Psyche. The

occurrence of stories of this type among totemic peoples, such as the

Tshi-speaking negroes of the Gold Coast, who tell them to explain their

totemic taboos, suggests that all such tales may have originated in

totemism. I shall deal with this question elsewhere.)

Members of a clan in Mandailing, on the west coast of Sumatra, assert

that they are descended from a tiger, and at the present day, when a

tiger is shot, the women of the clan are bound to offer betel to the

dead beast. When members of this clan come upon the tracks of a tiger,

they must, as a mark of homage, enclose them with three little sticks.

Further, it is believed that the tiger will not attack or lacerate his

kinsmen, the members of the clan. (H. Ris, "De Onderafdeeling Klein

Mandailing Oeloe en Pahantan en hare Bevolking met uitzondering van

de Oeloes", "Bijdragen tot de Tall- Land- en Volkenkunde van

Nederlansch-Indie, XLVI." (1896), page 473.) The Battas of Central

Sumatra are divided into a number of clans which have for their totems

white buffaloes, goats, wild turtle-doves, dogs, cats, apes, tigers, and

so forth; and one of the explanations which they give of their totems

is that these creatures were their ancestors, and that their own souls

after death can transmigrate into the animals. (J.B. Neumann, "Het

Pane en Bila-stroomgebied op het eiland Sumatra", "Tijdschrift van het

Nederlandsch Aardrijkskundig Genootschap", Tweede Serie, III. Afdeeling,

Meer uitgebreide Artikelen, No. 2 (Amsterdam, 1886), pages 311 sq.;

id. ib. Tweede Serie, IV. Afdeeling, Meer uitgebreide Artikelen, No. 1

(Amsterdam, 1887), pages 8 sq.) In Amboyna and the neighbouring islands

the inhabitants of some villages aver that they are descended from

trees, such as the Capellenia moluccana, which had been fertilised by

the Pandion Haliaetus. Others claim to be sprung from pigs, octopuses,

crocodiles, sharks, and eels. People will not burn the wood of the trees

from which they trace their descent, nor eat the flesh of the animals

which they regard as their ancestors. Sicknesses of all sorts are

believed to result from disregarding these taboos. (J.G.F. Riedel, "De

sluik- en kroesharige rassen tusschen Selebes en Papua" (The Hague,

1886), pages 32, 61; G.W.W.C. Baron van Hoevell, "Ambon en meer

bepaaldelijk de Oeliasers" (Dordrecht, 1875), page 152.) Similarly in

Ceram persons who think they are descended from crocodiles, serpents,

iguanas, and sharks will not eat the flesh of these animals. (J.G.F.

Riedel op. cit. page 122.) Many other peoples of the Molucca Islands

entertain similar beliefs and observe similar taboos. (J.G.F. Riedel

"De sluik- en kroesharige rassen tusschen Selebes en Papua" (The Hague,

1886), pages 253, 334, 341, 348, 412, 414, 432.) Again, in Ponape, one

of the Caroline Islands, "The different families suppose themselves to

stand in a certain relation to animals, and especially to fishes, and

believe in their descent from them. They actually name these animals

'mothers'; the creatures are sacred to the family and may not be

injured. Great dances, accompanied with the offering of prayers, are

performed in their honour. Any person who killed such an animal would

expose himself to contempt and punishment, certainly also to the

vengeance of the insulted deity." Blindness is commonly supposed to

be the consequence of such a sacrilege. (Dr Hahl, "Mittheilungen

uber Sitten und rechtliche Verhaltnisse auf Ponape", "Ethnologisches

Notizblatt", Vol. II. Heft 2 (Berlin, 1901), page 10.)

Some of the aborigines of Western Australia believe that their ancestors

were swans, ducks, or various other species of water-fowl before they

were transformed into men. (Captain G. Grey, "A Vocabulary of the

Dialects of South Western Australia", Second Edition (London, 1840),

pages 29, 37, 61, 63, 66, 71.) The Dieri tribe of Central Australia, who

are divided into totemic clans, explain their origin by the following

legend. They say that in the beginning the earth opened in the midst of

Perigundi Lake, and the totems (murdus or madas) came trooping out one

after the other. Out came the crow, and the shell parakeet, and the emu,

and all the rest. Being as yet imperfectly formed and without members

or organs of sense, they laid themselves down on the sandhills which

surrounded the lake then just as they do now. It was a bright day and

the totems lay basking in the sunshine, till at last, refreshed and

invigorated by it, they stood up as human beings and dispersed in all

directions. That is why people of the same totem are now scattered all

over the country. You may still see the island in the lake out of which

the totems came trooping long ago. (A.W. Howitt, "Native Tribes of

South-East Australia" (London, 1904), pages 476, 779 sq.) Another

Dieri legend relates how Paralina, one of the Mura-Muras or mythical

predecessors of the Dieri, perfected mankind. He was out hunting

kangaroos, when he saw four incomplete beings cowering together. So he

went up to them, smoothed their bodies, stretched out their limbs, slit

up their fingers and toes, formed their mouths, noses, and eyes, stuck

ears on them, and blew into their ears in order that they might hear.

Having perfected their organs and so produced mankind out of these

rudimentary beings, he went about making men everywhere. (A.W. Howitt

op. cit., pages 476, 780 sq.) Yet another Dieri tradition sets forth how

the Mura-Mura produced the race of man out of a species of small black

lizards, which may still be met with under dry bark. To do this he

divided the feet of the lizards into fingers and toes, and, applying

his forefinger to the middle of their faces, created a nose; likewise he

gave them human eyes, mouths and ears. He next set one of them upright,

but it fell down again because of its tail; so he cut off its tail and

the lizard then walked on its hind legs. That is the origin of mankind.

(S. Gason, "The Manners and Customs of the Dieyerie tribe of Australian

Aborigines", "Native Tribes of South Australia" (Adelaide, 1879),

page 260. This writer fell into the mistake of regarding the Mura-Mura

(Mooramoora) as a Good-Spirit instead of as one of the mythical but more

or less human predecessors of the Dieri in the country. See A.W. Howitt,

"Native Tribes of South-East Australia", pages 475 sqq.)

The Arunta tribe of Central Australia similarly tell how in the

beginning mankind was developed out of various rudimentary forms of

animal life. They say that in those days two beings called Ungambikula,

that is, "out of nothing," or "self-existing," dwelt in the western sky.

From their lofty abode they could see, far away to the east, a number

of inapertwa creatures, that is, rudimentary human beings or incomplete

men, whom it was their mission to make into real men and women. For at

that time there were no real men and women; the rudimentary creatures

(inapertwa) were of various shapes and dwelt in groups along the shore

of the salt water which covered the country. These embryos, as we may

call them, had no distinct limbs or organs of sight, hearing, and smell;

they did not eat food, and they presented the appearance of human beings

all doubled up into a rounded mass, in which only the outline of the

different parts of the body could be vaguely perceived. Coming down

from their home in the western sky, armed with great stone knives, the

Ungambikula took hold of the embryos, one after the other. First of all

they released the arms from the bodies, then making four clefts at the

end of each arm they fashioned hands and fingers; afterwards legs, feet,

and toes were added in the same way. The figure could now stand; a nose

was then moulded and the nostrils bored with the fingers. A cut with the

knife made the mouth, which was pulled open several times to render it

flexible. A slit on each side of the face separated the upper and lower

eye-lids, disclosing the eyes, which already existed behind them; and

a few strokes more completed the body. Thus out of the rudimentary

creatures were formed men and women. These rudimentary creatures or

embryos, we are told, "were in reality stages in the transformation

of various animals and plants into human beings, and thus they were

naturally, when made into human beings, intimately associated with the

particular animal or plant, as the case may be, of which they were the

transformations--in other words, each individual of necessity belonged

to a totem, the name of which was of course that of the animal or plant

of which he or she was a transformation." However, it is not said

that all the totemic clans of the Arunta were thus developed; no such

tradition, for example, is told to explain the origin of the important

Witchetty Grub clan. The clans which are positively known, or at least

said, to have originated out of embryos in the way described are the

Plum Tree, the Grass Seed, the Large Lizard, the Small Lizard, the

Alexandra Parakeet, and the Small Rat clans. When the Ungambikula had

thus fashioned people of these totems, they circumcised them all, except

the Plum Tree men, by means of a fire-stick. After that, having done the

work of creation or evolution, the Ungambikula turned themselves

into little lizards which bear a name meaning "snappers-up of flies."

(Baldwin Spencer and F.J. Gillen, "Native Tribes of Central Australia"

(London, 1899), pages 388 sq.; compare id., "Northern Tribes of Central

Australia" (London, 1904), page 150.)

This Arunta tradition of the origin of man, as Messrs Spencer and

Gillen, who have recorded it, justly observe, "is of considerable

interest; it is in the first place evidently a crude attempt to describe

the origin of human beings out of non-human creatures who were of

various forms; some of them were representatives of animals, others of

plants, but in all cases they are to be regarded as intermediate stages

in the transition of an animal or plant ancestor into a human individual

who bore its name as that of his or her totem." (Baldwin Spencer and

F.J. Gillen, "Native Tribes of Central Australia", pages 391 sq.) In a

sense these speculations of the Arunta on their own origin may be said

to combine the theory of creation with the theory of evolution; for

while they represent men as developed out of much simpler forms of life,

they at the same time assume that this development was effected by the

agency of two powerful beings, whom so far we may call creators. It is

well known that at a far higher stage of culture a crude form of

the evolutionary hypothesis was propounded by the Greek philosopher

Empedocles. He imagined that shapeless lumps of earth and water, thrown

up by the subterranean fires, developed into monstrous animals, bulls

with the heads of men, men with the heads of bulls, and so forth; till

at last, these hybrid forms being gradually eliminated, the various

existing species of animals and men were evolved. (E. Zeller, "Die

Philosophie der Griechen", I.4 (Leipsic, 1876), pages 718 sq.; H. Ritter

et L. Preller, "Historia Philosophiae Graecae et Romanae ex fontium

locis contexta" 5, pages 102 sq. H. Diels, "Die Fragmente der

Vorsokratiker" 2, I. (Berlin, 1906), pages 190 sqq. Compare Lucretius "De

rerum natura", V. 837 sqq.) The theory of the civilised Greek of Sicily

may be set beside the similar theory of the savage Arunta of Central

Australia. Both represent gropings of the human mind in the dark abyss

of the past; both were in a measure grotesque anticipations of the

modern theory of evolution.

In this essay I have made no attempt to illustrate all the many various

and divergent views which primitive man has taken of his own origin. I

have confined myself to collecting examples of two radically different

views, which may be distinguished as the theory of creation and the

theory of evolution. According to the one, man was fashioned in his

existing shape by a god or other powerful being; according to the other

he was evolved by a natural process out of lower forms of animal life.

Roughly speaking, these two theories still divide the civilised world

between them. The partisans of each can appeal in support of their view

to a large consensus of opinion; and if truth were to be decided by

weighing the one consensus against the other, with "Genesis" in the

one scale and "The Origin of Species" in the other, it might perhaps be

found, when the scales were finally trimmed, that the balance hung very

even between creation and evolution.

X. THE INFLUENCE OF DARWIN ON THE STUDY OF ANIMAL EMBRYOLOGY. By A.

Sedgwick, M.A., F.R.S.

Professor of Zoology and Comparative Anatomy in the University of

Cambridge.

The publication of "The Origin of Species" ushered in a new era in the

study of Embryology. Whereas, before the year 1859 the facts of anatomy

and development were loosely held together by the theory of types, which

owed its origin to the great anatomists of the preceding generation,

to Cuvier, L. Agassiz, J. Muller, and R. Owen, they were now combined

together into one organic whole by the theory of descent and by the

hypothesis of recapitulation which was deduced from that theory. The

view (First clearly enunciated by Fritz Muller in his well-known work,

"Fur Darwin", Leipzig, 1864; (English Edition, "Facts for Darwin",

1869).) that a knowledge of embryonic and larval histories would lay

bare the secrets of race-history and enable the course of evolution

to be traced, and so lead to the discovery of the natural system of

classification, gave a powerful stimulus to morphological study in

general and to embryological investigation in particular. In Darwin's

words: "Embryology rises greatly in interest, when we look at the embryo

as a picture, more or less obscured, of the progenitor, either in its

adult or larval state, of all the members of the same great class."

("Origin" (6th edition), page 396.) In the period under consideration

the output of embryological work has been enormous. No group of the

animal kingdom has escaped exhaustive examination and no effort has been

spared to obtain the embryos of isolated and out of the way forms, the

development of which might have an important bearing upon questions

of phylogeny and classification. Marine zoological stations have been

established, expeditions have been sent to distant countries, and the

methods of investigation have been greatly improved. The result of this

activity has been that the main features of the developmental history

of all the most important animals are now known and the curiosity as to

developmental processes, so greatly excited by the promulgation of the

Darwinian theory, has to a considerable extent been satisfied.

To what extent have the results of this vast activity fulfilled the

expectations of the workers who have achieved them? The Darwin centenary

is a fitting moment at which to take stock of our position. In this

inquiry we shall leave out of consideration the immense and intensely

interesting additions to our knowledge of Natural History. These may be

said to constitute a capital fund upon which philosophers, poets and

men of science will draw for many generations. The interest of Natural

History existed long before Darwinian evolution was thought of and

will endure without any reference to philosophic speculations. She is

a mistress in whose face are beauties and in whose arms are delights

elsewhere unattainable. She is and always has been pursued for her own

sake without any reference to philosophy, science, or utility.

Darwin's own views of the bearing of the facts of embryology upon

questions of wide scientific interest are perfectly clear. He writes

("Origin" (6th edition), page 395.):

"On the other hand it is highly probable that with many animals the

embryonic or larval stages show us, more or less completely, the

condition of the progenitor of the whole group in its adult state. In

the great class of the Crustacea, forms wonderfully distinct from each

other, namely, suctorial parasites, cirripedes, entomostraca, and even

the malacostraca, appear at first as larvae under the nauplius-form; and

as these larvae live and feed in the open sea, and are not adapted for

any peculiar habits of life, and from other reasons assigned by Fritz

Muller, it is probable that at some very remote period an independent

adult animal, resembling the Nauplius, existed, and subsequently

produced, along several divergent lines of descent, the above-named

great Crustacean groups. So again it is probable, from what we know of

the embryos of mammals, birds, fishes, and reptiles, that these animals

are the modified descendants of some ancient progenitor, which was

furnished in its adult state with branchiae, a swim-bladder, four

fin-like limbs, and a long tail, all fitted for an aquatic life.

"As all the organic beings, extinct and recent, which have ever lived,

can be arranged within a few great classes; and as all within each

class have, according to our theory, been connected together by fine

gradations, the best, and, if our collections were nearly perfect, the

only possible arrangement, would be genealogical; descent being the

hidden bond of connexion which naturalists have been seeking under the

term of the Natural System. On this view we can understand how it is

that, in the eyes of most naturalists, the structure of the embryo is

even more important for classification than that of the adult. In two or

more groups of animals, however much they may differ from each other

in structure and habits in their adult condition, if they pass through

closely similar embryonic stages, we may feel assured that they all are

descended from one parent-form, and are therefore closely related.

Thus, community in embryonic structure reveals community of descent; but

dissimilarity in embryonic development does not prove discommunity of

descent, for in one of two groups the developmental stages may have been

suppressed, or may have been so greatly modified through adaptation to

new habits of life, as to be no longer recognisable. Even in groups, in

which the adults have been modified to an extreme degree, community of

origin is often revealed by the structure of the larvae; we have seen,

for instance, that cirripedes, though externally so like shell-fish,

are at once known by their larvae to belong to the great class of

crustaceans. As the embryo often shows us more or less plainly the

structure of the less modified and ancient progenitor of the group, we

can see why ancient and extinct forms so often resemble in their

adult state the embryos of existing species of the same class. Agassiz

believes this to be a universal law of nature; and we may hope hereafter

to see the law proved true. It can, however, be proved true only in

those cases in which the ancient state of the progenitor of the group

has not been wholly obliterated, either by successive variations having

supervened at a very early period of growth, or by such variations

having been inherited at an earlier stage than that at which they first

appeared. It should also be borne in mind, that the law may be true,

but yet, owing to the geological record not extending far enough back

in time, may remain for a long period, or for ever, incapable of

demonstration. The law will not strictly hold good in those cases in

which an ancient form became adapted in its larval state to some special

line of life, and transmitted the same larval state to a whole group of

descendants; for such larvae will not resemble any still more ancient

form in its adult state."

As this passage shows, Darwin held that embryology was of interest

because of the light it seems to throw upon ancestral history

(phylogeny) and because of the help it would give in enabling us to

arrive at a natural system of classification. With regard to the latter

point, he quotes with approval the opinion that "the structure of

the embryo is even more important for classification than that of the

adult." What justification is there for this view? The phase of life

chosen for the ordinary anatomical and physiological studies, namely,

the adult phase, is merely one of the large number of stages of

structure through which the organism passes. By far the greater number

of these are included in what is specially called the developmental

or (if we include larvae with embryos) embryonic period, for the

developmental changes are more numerous and take place with greater

rapidity at the beginning of life than in its later periods. As each of

these stages is equal in value, for our present purpose, to the adult

phase, it clearly follows that if there is anything in the view that

the anatomical study of organisms is of importance in determining their

mutual relations, the study of the organism in its various embryonic

(and larval) stages must have a greater importance than the study of the

single and arbitrarily selected stage of life called the adult.

But a deeper reason than this has been assigned for the importance of

embryology in classification. It has been asserted, and is implied by

Darwin in the passage quoted, that the ancestral history is repeated

in a condensed form in the embryonic, and that a study of the latter

enables us to form a picture of the stages of structure through which

the organism has passed in its evolution. It enables us on this view to

reconstruct the pedigrees of animals and so to form a genealogical tree

which shall be the true expression of their natural relations.

The real question which we have to consider is to what extent the

embryological studies of the last 50 years have confirmed or rendered

probable this "theory of recapitulation." In the first place it must

be noted that the recapitulation theory is itself a deduction from the

theory of evolution. The facts of embryology, particularly of vertebrate

embryology, and of larval history receive, it is argued, an explanation

on the view that the successive stages of development are, on the

whole, records of adult stages of structure which the species has passed

through in its evolution. Whether this statement will bear a critical

verbal examination I will not now pause to inquire, for it is more

important to determine whether any independent facts can be alleged in

favour of the theory. If it could be shown, as was stated to be the case

by L. Agassiz, that ancient and extinct forms of life present features

of structure now only found in embryos, we should have a body of facts

of the greatest importance in the present discussion. But as Huxley (See

Huxley's "Scientific Memoirs", London, 1898, Vol. I. page 303: "There is

no real parallel between the successive forms assumed in the development

of the life of the individual at present, and those which have appeared

at different epochs in the past." See also his Address to the

Geological Society of London (1862) 'On the Palaeontological Evidence of

Evolution', ibid. Vol. II. page 512.) has shown and as the whole course

of palaeontological and embryological investigation has demonstrated, no

such statement can be made. The extinct forms of life are very similar

to those now existing and there is nothing specially embryonic about

them. So that the facts, as we know them, lend no support to theory.

But there is another class of facts which have been alleged in favour

of the theory, viz. the facts which have been included in the

generalisation known as the Law of v. Baer. The law asserts that embryos

of different species of animals of the same group are more alike

than the adults and that, the younger the embryo, the greater are the

resemblances. If this law could be established it would undoubtedly be

a strong argument in favour of the "recapitulation" explanation of the

facts of embryology. But its truth has been seriously disputed. If it

were true we should expect to find that the embryos of closely similar

species would be indistinguishable from one another, but this is

notoriously not the case. It is more difficult to meet the assertion

when it is made in the form given above, for here we are dealing with

matters of opinion. For instance, no one would deny that the embryo of a

dogfish is different from the embryo of a rabbit, but there is room for

difference of opinion when it is asserted that the difference is less

than the difference between an adult dogfish and an adult rabbit. It

would be perfectly true to say that the differences between the embryos

concern other organs more than do the differences between the adults,

but who is prepared to affirm that the presence of a cephalic coelom and

of cranial segments, of external gills, of six gill slits, of the kidney

tubes opening into the muscle-plate coelom, of an enormous yolk-sac, of

a neurenteric canal, and the absence of any trace of an amnion, of an

allantois and of a primitive streak are not morphological facts of as

high an import as those implied by the differences between the adults?

The generalisation undoubtedly had its origin in the fact that there is

what may be called a family resemblance between embryos and larvae, but

this resemblance, which is by no means exact, is largely superficial and

does not extend to anatomical detail.

It is useless to say, as Weismann has stated ("The Evolution Theory",

by A. Weismann, English Translation, Vol. II. page 176, London, 1904.),

that "it cannot be disputed that the rudiments [vestiges his translator

means] of gill-arches and gill-clefts, which are peculiar to one stage

of human ontogeny, give us every ground for concluding that we possessed

fish-like ancestors." The question at issue is: did the pharyngeal

arches and clefts of mammalian embryos ever discharge a branchial

function in an adult ancestor of the mammalia? We cannot therefore,

without begging the question at issue in the grossest manner, apply to

them the terms "gill-arches" and "gill-clefts". That they are homologous

with the "gill-arches" and "gill-clefts" of fishes is true; but there

is no evidence to show that they ever discharged a branchial function.

Until such evidence is forthcoming, it is beside the point to say that

it "cannot be disputed" that they are evidence of a piscine ancestry.

It must, therefore, be admitted that one outcome of the progress of

embryological and palaeontological research for the last 50 years is

negative. The recapitulation theory originated as a deduction from the

evolution theory and as a deduction it still remains.

Let us before leaving the subject apply another test. If the evolution

theory and the recapitulation theory are both true, how is it that

living birds are not only without teeth but have no rudiments of teeth

at any stage of their existence? How is it that the missing digits in

birds and mammals, the missing or reduced limb of snakes and whales, the

reduced mandibulo-hyoid cleft of elasmobranch fishes are not present or

relatively more highly developed in the embryo than in the adult? How

is it that when a marked variation, such as an extra digit, or a reduced

limb, or an extra segment, makes its appearance, it is not confined to

the adult but can be seen all through the development? All the clear

evidence we can get tends to show that marked variations, whether of

reduction or increase, of organs are manifest during the whole of the

development of the organ and do not merely affect the adult. And on

reflection we see that it could hardly be otherwise. All such evidence

is distinctly at variance with the theory of recapitulation, at least

as applied to embryos. In the case of larvae of course the case will be

different, for in them the organs are functional, and reduction in the

adult will not be accompanied by reduction in the larva unless a change

in the conditions of life of the larva enables it to occur.

If after 50 years of research and close examination of the facts of

embryology the recapitulation theory is still without satisfactory

proof, it seems desirable to take a wider sweep and to inquire whether

the facts of embryology cannot be included in a larger category.

As has been pointed out by Huxley, development and life are

co-extensive, and it is impossible to point to any period in the life of

an organism when the developmental changes cease. It is true that these

changes take place more rapidly at the commencement of life, but they

are never wholly absent, and those which occur in the later or so-called

adult stages of life do not differ in their essence, however much they

may differ in their degree, from those which occur during the embryonic

and larval periods. This consideration at once brings the changes of

the embryonic period into the same category as those of the adult and

suggests that an explanation which will account for the one will account

for the other. What then is the problem we are dealing with? Surely

it is this: Why does an organism as soon as it is established at the

fertilisation of the ovum enter upon a cycle of transformations which

never cease until death puts an end to them? In other words what is

the meaning of that cycle of changes which all organisms present in a

greater or less degree and which constitute the very essence of life?

It is impossible to give an answer to this question so long as we remain

within the precincts of Biology--and it is not my present purpose to

penetrate beyond those precincts into the realms of philosophy. We have

to do with an ultimate biological fact, with a fundamental property of

living matter, which governs and includes all its other properties. How

may this property be stated? Thus: it is a property of living matter

to react in a remarkable way to external forces without undergoing

destruction. The life-cycle, of which the embryonic and larval periods

are a part, consists of the orderly interaction between the organism

and its environment. The action of the environment produces certain

morphological changes in the organism. These changes enable the organism

to come into relation with new external forces, to move into what

is practically a new environment, which in its turn produces further

structural changes in the organism. These in their turn enable, indeed

necessitate, the organism to move again into a new environment, and so

the process continues until the structural changes are of such a nature

that the organism is unable to adapt itself to the environment in which

it finds itself. The essential condition of success in this process is

that the organism should always shift into the environment to which its

new structure is suited--any failure in this leading to the impairment

of the organism. In most cases the shifting of the environment is a

very gradual process (whether consisting in the very slight and gradual

alteration in the relation of the embryo as a whole to the egg-shell or

uterine wall, or in the relations of its parts to each other, or in

the successive phases of adult life), and the morphological changes in

connection with each step of it are but slight. But in some cases jumps

are made such as we find in the phenomena known as hatching, birth, and

metamorphosis.

This property of reacting to the environment without undergoing

destruction is, as has been stated, a fundamental property of organisms.

It is impossible to conceive of any matter, to which the term living

could be applied, being without it. And with this property of reacting

to the environment goes the further property of undergoing a change

which alters the relation of the organism to the old environment

and places it in a new environment. If this reasoning is correct, it

necessarily follows that this property must have been possessed by

living matter at its first appearance on the earth. In other words

living matter must always have presented a life-cycle, and the question

arises what kind of modification has that cycle undergone? Has it

increased or diminished in duration and complexity since organisms first

appeared on the earth? The current view is that the cycle was at first

very short and that it has increased in length by the evolutionary

creation of new adult phases, that these new phases are in addition to

those already existing and that each of them as it appears takes

over from the preceding adult phase the functional condition of the

reproductive organs. According to the same view the old adult phases are

not obliterated but persist in a more or less modified form as larval

stages. It is further supposed that as the life-history lengthens at one

end by the addition of new adult phases, it is shortened at the other by

the abbreviation of embryonic development and by the absorption of some

of the early larval stages into the embryonic period; but on the whole

the lengthening process has exceeded that of shortening, so that the

whole life-history has, with the progress of evolution, become longer

and more complicated.

Now there can be no doubt that the life-history of organisms has been

shortened in the way above suggested, for cases are known in which this

can practically be seen to occur at the present day. But the process

of lengthening by the creation of new stages at the other end of the

life-cycle is more difficult to conceive and moreover there is no

evidence for its having occurred. This, indeed, may have occurred, as

is suggested below, but the evidence we have seems to indicate

that evolutionary modification has proceeded by ALTERING and not by

SUPERSEDING: that is to say that each stage in the life-history, as we

see it to-day, has proceeded from a corresponding stage in a former era

by the modification of that stage and not by the creation of a new one.

Let me, at the risk of repetition, explain my meaning more fully by

taking a concrete illustration. The mandibulo-hyoid cleft (spiracle)

of the elasmobranch fishes, the lateral digits of the pig's foot, the

hind-limbs of whales, the enlarged digit of the ostrich's foot

are supposed to be organs which have been recently modified.

This modification is not confined to the final adult stage of the

life-history but characterises them throughout the whole of their

development. A stage with a reduced spiracle does not proceed in

development from a preceding stage in which the spiracle shows no

reduction: it is reduced at its first appearance. The same statement may

be made of organs which have entirely disappeared in the adult, such as

bird's teeth and snake's fore-limbs: the adult stage in which they have

disappeared is not preceded by embryonic stages in which the teeth and

limbs or rudiments of them are present. In fact the evidence indicates

that adult variations of any part are accompanied by precedent

variations in the same direction in the embryo. The evidence seems to

show, not that a stage is added on at the end of the life-history, but

only that some of the stages in the life-history are modified. Indeed,

on the wider view of development taken in this essay, a view which makes

it coincident with life, one would not expect often to find, even if new

stages are added in the course of evolution, that they are added at the

end of the series when the organism has passed through its reproductive

period. It is possible of course that new stages have been intercalated

in the course of the life-history, though it is difficult to see

how this has occurred. It is much more likely, if we may judge from

available evidence, that every stage has had its counterpart in

the ancestral form from which it has been derived by descent with

modification. Just as the adult phase of the living form differs, owing

to evolutionary modification, from the adult phase of the ancestor from

which it has proceeded, so each larval phase will differ for the same

reason from the corresponding larval phase in the life-history of the

ancestor. Inasmuch as the organism is variable at every stage of its

independent existence and is exposed to the action of natural selection

there is no reason why it should escape modification at any stage.

If there is any truth in these considerations it would seem to follow

that at the dawn of life the life-cycle must have been, either in posse

or in esse, at least as long as it is at the present time, and that

the peculiarity of passing through a series of stages in which new

characters are successively evolved is a primordial quality of living

matter.

Before leaving this part of the subject, it is necessary to touch upon

another aspect of it. What are these variations in structure which

succeed one another in the life-history of an organism? I am conscious

that I am here on the threshold of a chamber which contains the clue to

some of our difficulties, and that I cannot enter it. Looked at from

one point of view they belong to the class of genetic variations, which

depend upon the structure or constitution of the protoplasm; but instead

of appearing in different zygotes (A zygote is a fertilised ovum, i.e. a

new organism resulting from the fusion of an ovum and a spermatozoon.),

they are present in the same zygote though at different times in its

life-history. They are of the same order as the mutational variations

of the modern biologist upon which the appearance of a new character

depends. What is a genetic or mutational variation? It is a genetic

character which was not present in either of the parents. But these

"growth variations" were present in the parents, and in this they differ

from mutational variations. But what are genetic characters? They are

characters which must appear if any development occurs. They are usually

contrasted with "acquired characters," using the expression "acquired

character" in the Lamarckian sense. But strictly speaking they ARE

acquired characters, for the zygote at first has none of the characters

which it subsequently acquires, but only the power of acquiring them

in response to the action of the environment. But the characters so

acquired are not what we technically understand and what Lamarck meant

by "acquired characters." They are genetic characters, as defined above.

What then are Lamarck's "acquired characters"? They are variations in

genetic characters caused in a particular way. There are, in fact,

two kinds of variation in genetic characters depending on the mode

of causation. Firstly, there are those variations consequent upon a

variation in the constitution of the protoplasm of a particular zygote,

and independent of the environment in which the organism develops,

save in so far as this simply calls them forth: these are the so-called

genetic or mutational variations. Secondly, there are those variations

which occur in zygotes of similar germinal constitution and which are

caused solely by differences in the environment to which the individuals

are respectively exposed: these are the "acquired characters" of Lamarck

and of authors generally. In consequence of this double sense in which

the term "acquired characters" may be used, great confusion may and

does occur. If the protoplasm be compared to a machine, and the external

conditions to the hand that works the machine, then it may be said that,

as the machine can only work in one way, it can only produce one kind

of result (genetic character), but the particular form or quality

(Lamarckian "acquired character") of the result will depend upon the

hand that works the machine (environment), just as the quality of the

sound produced by a fiddle depends entirely upon the hand which plays

upon it. It would be improper to apply the term "mutation" to those

genetic characters which are not new characters or new variants of old

characters, but such genetic characters are of the same nature as

those characters to which the term mutation has been applied. It may be

noticed in passing that it is very questionable if the modern biologist

has acted in the real interests of science in applying the term mutation

in the sense in which he has applied it. The genetic characters of

organisms come from one of two sources: either they are old characters

and are due to the action of what we call inheritance or they are new

and are due to what we call variation. If the term mutation is applied

to the actual alteration of the machinery of the protoplasm, no

objection can be felt to its use; but if it be applied, as it is, to the

product of the action of the altered machine, viz. to the new genetic

character, it leads to confusion. Inheritance is the persistence of the

structure of the machine; characters are the products of the working of

the machine; variation in genetic characters is due to the alteration

(mutation) in the arrangement of the machinery, while variation in

acquired characters (Lamarckian) is due to differences in the mode of

working the machinery. The machinery when it starts (in the new zygote)

has the power of grinding out certain results, which we call the

characters of the organism. These appear at successive intervals

of time, and the orderly manifestation of them is what we call the

life-history of the organism. This brings us back to the question with

which we started this discussion, viz. what is the relation of these

variations in structure, which successively appear in an organism and

constitute its life-history, to the mutational variations which appear

in different organisms of the same brood or species. The question is

brought home to us when we ask what is a bud-sport, such as a nectarine

appearing on a peach-tree? From one point of view, it is simply a

mutation appearing in asexual reproduction; from another it is one of

these successional characters ("growth variations") which constitute

the life-history of the zygote, for it appears in the same zygote which

first produces a peach. Here our analogy of a machine which only works

in one way seems to fail us, for these bud-sports do not appear in all

parts of the organism, only in certain buds or parts of it, so that one

part of the zygotic machine would appear to work differently to another.

To discuss this question further would take us too far from our subject.

Suffice it to say that we cannot answer it, any more than we can this

further question of burning interest at the present day, viz. to

what extent and in what manner is the machine itself altered by the

particular way in which it is worked. In connection with this question

we can only submit one consideration: the zygotic machine can, by

its nature, only work once, so that any alteration in it can only be

ascertained by studying the replicas of it which are produced in the

reproductive organs.

It is a peculiarity that the result which we call the ripening of the

generative organs nearly always appears among the final products of the

action of the zygotic machine. It is remarkable that this should be

the case. What is the reason of it? The late appearance of functional

reproductive organs is almost a universal law, and the explanation of it

is suggested by expressing the law in another way, viz. that the machine

is almost always so constituted that it ceases to work efficiently

soon after the reproductive organs have sufficiently discharged their

function. Why this should occur we cannot explain: it is an ultimate

fact of nature, and cannot be included in any wider category. The

period during which the reproductive organs can act may be short as

in ephemerids or long as in man and trees, and there is no reason to

suppose that their action damages the vital machinery, though sometimes,

as in the case of annual plants (Metschnikoff), it may incidentally

do so; but, long or short, the cessation of their actions is always

a prelude to the end. When they and their action are impaired, the

organism ceases to react with precision to the environment, and the

organism as a whole undergoes retrogressive changes.

It has been pointed out above that there is reason to believe that at

the dawn of life the life-cycle was, EITHER IN ESSE OR IN POSSE, at

least as long as it is at the present time. The qualification implied by

the words in italics is necessary, for it is clearly possible that the

external conditions then existing were not suitable for the production

of all the stages of the potential life-history, and that what we

call organic evolution has consisted in a gradual evolution of new

environments to which the organism's innate capacity of change has

enabled it to adapt itself. We have warrant for this possibility in the

case of the Axolotl and in other similar cases of neoteny. And these

cases further bring home to us the fact, to which I have already

referred, that the full development of the functional reproductive

organs is nearly always associated with the final stages of the

life-history.

On this view of the succession of characters in the life-history of

organisms, how shall we explain the undoubted fact that the development

of buds hardly ever presents any phenomena corresponding to the

embryonic and larval changes? The reason is clearly this, that budding

usually occurs after the embryonic stage is past; when the characters of

embryonic life have been worked out by the machine. When it takes place

at an early stage in embryonic life, as it does in cases of so-called

embryonic fission, the product shows, either partly or entirely,

phenomena similar to those of embryonic development. The only case known

to me in which budding by the adult is accompanied by morphological

features similar to those displayed by embryos is furnished by the

budding of the medusiform spore-sacs of hydrozoon polyps. But this case

is exceptional, for here we have to do with an attempt, which fails, to

form a free-swimming organism, the medusa; and the vestiges which appear

in the buds are the umbrella-cavity, marginal tentacles, circular canal,

etc., of the medusa arrested in development.

But the question still remains, are there no cases in which, as implied

by the recapitulation theory, variations in any organ are confined to

the period in which the organ is functional and do not affect it in the

embryonic stages? The teeth of the whalebone whales may be cited as

a case in which this is said to occur; but here the teeth are only

imperfectly developed in the embryo and are soon absorbed. They have

been affected by the change which has produced their disappearance in

the adult, but not to complete extinction. Nor are they now likely to be

extinguished, for having become exclusively embryonic they are largely

protected from the action of natural selection. This consideration

brings up a most important aspect of the question, so far as

disappearing organs are concerned. Every organ is laid down at a certain

period in the embryo and undergoes a certain course of growth until

it obtains full functional development. When for any cause reduction

begins, it is affected at all stages of its growth, unless it has

functional importance in the larva, and in some cases its life is

shortened at one or both ends. In cases, as in that of the whale's

teeth, in which it entirely disappears in the adult, the latter part

of its life is cut off; in others, the beginning of its life may

be deferred. This happens, for instance, with the spiracle of many

Elasmobranchs, which makes its appearance after the hyobranchial cleft,

not before it as it should do, being anterior to it in position, and

as it does in the Amniota in which it shows no reduction in size as

compared with the other pharyngeal clefts. In those Elasmobranchs

in which it is absent in the adult but present in the embryo (e.g.

Carcharias) its life is shortened at both ends. Many more instances

of organs, of which the beginning and end have been cut off, might be

mentioned; e.g. the muscle-plate coelom of Aves, the primitive streak

and the neurenteric canal of amniote blastoderms. In yet other cases in

which the reduced organ is almost on the verge of disappearance, it

may appear for a moment and disappear more than once in the course of

development. As an instance of this striking phenomenon I may mention

the neurenteric canal of avine embryos, and the anterior neuropore of

Ascidians. Lastly the reduced organ may disappear in the developing

stages before it does so in the adult. As an instance of this may be

mentioned the mandibular palp of those Crustacea with zoaea larvae. This

structure disappears in the larva only to reappear in a reduced form in

later stages. In all these cases we are dealing with an organ which, we

imagine, attained a fuller functional development at some previous stage

in race-history, but in most of them we have no proof that it did so. It

may be, and the possibility must not be lost sight of, that these organs

never were anything else than functionless and that though they have

been got rid of in the adult by elimination in the course of time, they

have been able to persist in embryonic stages which are protected from

the full action of natural selection. There is no reason to suppose that

living matter at its first appearance differed from non-living matter

in possessing only properties conducive to its well-being and prolonged

existence. No one thinks that the properties of the various forms of

inorganic matter are all strictly related to external conditions.

Of what use to the diamond is its high specific gravity and high

refrangibility, and to gold of its yellow colour and great weight? These

substances continue to exist in virtue of other properties than these.

It is impossible to suppose that the properties of living matter at

its first appearance were all useful to it, for even now after aeons of

elimination we find that it possesses many useless organs and that

many of its relations to the external world are capable of considerable

improvement.

In writing this essay I have purposely refrained from taking a definite

position with regard to the problems touched. My desire has been

to write a chapter showing the influence of Darwin's work so far as

Embryology is concerned, and the various points which come up for

consideration in discussing his views. Darwin was the last man who would

have claimed finality for any of his doctrines, but he might fairly have

claimed to have set going a process of intellectual fermentation which

is still very far from completion.