Notice in the gorilla"s skull the protrusive face region, the big eyebrow ridges, the much less domed cranial cavity, the ma.s.sive lower jaw, the big canine teeth. Notice in man"s skull the well-developed forehead, the domed and s.p.a.cious cranial cavity, the absence of any snout, the chin process, and many other marked differences separating the human skull from the ape"s.]
[Ill.u.s.tration: THE SKULL AND BRAIN-CASE OF PITHECANTHROPUS, THE JAVA APE-MAN, AS RESTORED. BY J. H. McGREGOR FROM THE SCANTY REMAINS The restoration shows the low, retreating forehead and the prominent eyebrow ridges.]
[Ill.u.s.tration: SUGGESTED GENEALOGICAL TREE OF MAN AND ANTHROPOID APES.
From Sir Arthur Keith; the lettering to the right has been slightly simplified.]
We are on firmer, though still uncertain, ground when we state the probability that it was in Asia that the precursors of man were separated off from monkeys and apes, and began to be terrestrial rather than arboreal. Professor Lull points out that Asia is nearest to the oldest known human remains (in Java), and that Asia was the seat of the most ancient civilisations and the original home of many domesticated animals and cultivated plants. The probability is that the cradle of the human race was in Asia.
Man"s Arboreal Apprenticeship.
At this point it will be useful to consider man"s arboreal apprenticeship and how he became a terrestrial journeyman. Professor Wood Jones has worked out very convincingly the thesis that man had no direct four-footed ancestry, but that the Primate stock to which he belongs was from its first divergence arboreal. He maintains that the leading peculiarities of the immediate precursors of man were wrought out during a long arboreal apprenticeship. The first great gain of arboreal life on bipedal erect lines (not after the quadrupedal fashion of tree-sloths, for instance) was the emanc.i.p.ation of the hand. The foot became the supporting and branch-gripping member, and the hand was set free to reach upward, to hang on by, to seize the fruit, to lift it and hold it to the mouth, and to hug the young one close to the breast. The hand thus set free has remained plastic--a generalised, not a specialised member. Much has followed from man"s "handiness."
The arboreal life had many other consequences. It led to an increased freedom of movement of the thigh on the hip joint, to muscular arrangements for balancing the body on the leg, to making the backbone a supple yet stable curved pillar, to a strongly developed collar-bone which is only found well-formed when the fore-limb is used for more than support, and to a power of "opposing" the thumb and the big toe to the other digits of the hand and foot--an obvious advantage for branch-gripping. But the evolution of a free hand made it possible to dispense with protrusive lips and gripping teeth. Thus began the recession of the snout region, the a.s.sociated enlargement of the brain-box, and the bringing of the eyes to the front. The overcrowding of the teeth that followed the shortening of the snout was one of the taxes on progress of which modern man is often reminded in his dental troubles.
Another acquisition a.s.sociated with arboreal life was a greatly increased power of turning the head from side to side--a mobility very important in locating sounds and in exploring with the eyes. Furthermore, there came about a flattening of the chest and of the back, and the movements of the midriff (or diaphragm) came to count for more in respiration than the movements of the ribs. The sense of touch came to be of more importance and the sense of smell of less; the part of the brain receiving tidings from hand and eye and ear came to predominate over the part for receiving olfactory messages. Finally, the need for carrying the infant about among the branches must surely have implied an intensification of family relations, and favoured the evolution of gentleness.
[Ill.u.s.tration: Photo: New York Zoological Park.
THE GIBBON IS LOWER THAN THE OTHER APES AS REGARDS ITS SKULL AND DENt.i.tION, BUT IT IS HIGHLY SPECIALIZED IN THE ADAPTATION OF ITS LIMBS TO ARBOREAL LIFE]
[Ill.u.s.tration: Photo: New York Zoological Park.
THE ORANG HAS A HIGH ROUNDED SKULL AND A LONG FACE]
[Ill.u.s.tration: Photo: British Museum (Natural History).
COMPARISONS OF THE SKELETONS OF HORSE AND MAN.
Bone for bone, the two skeletons are like one another, though man is a biped and the horse a quadruped. The backbone in man is mainly vertical; the backbone in the horse is horizontal except in the neck and the tail. Man"s skull is mainly in a line with the backbone; the horse"s at an angle to it. Both man and horse have seven neck vertebr-. Man has five digits on each limb; the horse has only one digit well developed on each limb.]
It may be urged that we are attaching too much importance to the arboreal apprenticeship, since many tree-loving animals remain to-day very innocent creatures. To this reasonable objection there are two answers, first that in its many acquisitions the arboreal evolution of the humanoid precursors of man prepared the way for the survival of a human type marked by a great step in brain-development; and second that the pa.s.sage from the humanoid to the human was probably a.s.sociated with a return to mother earth.
According to Professor Lull, to whose fine textbook, Organic Evolution(1917), we are much indebted, "climatic conditions in Asia in the Miocene or early Pliocene were such as to compel the descent of the pre-human ancestor from the trees, a step which was absolutely essential to further human development." Continental elevation and consequent aridity led to a dwindling of the forests, and forced the ape-man to come to earth. "And at the last arose the man."
According to Lull, the descent from the trees was a.s.sociated with the a.s.sumption of a more erect posture, with increased liberation and plasticity of the hand, with becoming a hunter, with experiments towards clothing and shelter, with an exploring habit, and with the beginning of communal life.
It is a plausible view that the transition from the humanoid to the human was effected by a discontinuous variation of considerable magnitude, what is nowadays called a mutation, and that it had mainly to do with the brain and the vocal organs. But given the gains of the arboreal apprenticeship, the stimulus of an enforced descent to terra firma, and an evolving brain and voice, we can recognise accessory factors which helped success to succeed. Perhaps the absence of great physical strength prompted reliance on wits; the prolongation of infancy would help to educate the parents in gentleness; the strengthening of the feeling of kinship would favour the evolution of family and social life--of which there are many antic.i.p.ations at lower levels. There is much truth in the saying: "Man did not make society, society made man."
A continuation of the story will deal with the emergence of the primitive types of man and the gradual ascent of the modern species.
-- 4.
Tentative Men.
So far the story has been that of the sifting out of a humanoid stock and of the transition to human kind, from the ancestors of apes and men to the man-ape, and from the man-ape to man. It looks as if the sifting-out process had proceeded further, for there were several human branches that did not lead on to the modern type of man.
1. The first of these is represented by the scanty fossil remains known as Pithecanthropus erectus, found in Java in fossiliferous beds which date from the end of the Pliocene or the beginning of the Pleistocene era. Perhaps this means half a million years ago, and the remains occurred along with those of some mammals which are now extinct. Unfortunately the remains of Pithecanthropus the Erect consisted only of a skull-cap, a thigh-bone, and two back teeth, so it is not surprising that experts should differ considerably in their interpretation of what was found. Some have regarded the remains as those of a large gibbon, others as those of a pre-human ape-man, and others as those of a primitive man off the main line of ascent. According to Sir Arthur Keith, Pithecanthropus was "a being human in stature, human in gait, human in all its parts, save its brain." The thigh-bone indicates a height of about 5 feet 7 inches, one inch less than the average height of the men of to-day. The skull-cap indicates a low, flat forehead, beetling brows, and a capacity about two-thirds of the modern size. The remains were found by Dubois, in 1894, in Trinil in Central Java.
2. The next offshoot is represented by the Heidelberg man (h.o.m.o heidelbergensis), discovered near Heidelberg in 1907 by Dr. Schoetensack. But the remains consisted only of a lower jaw and its teeth. Along with this relic were bones of various mammals, including some long since extinct in Europe, such as elephant, rhinoceros, bison, and lion. The circ.u.mstances indicate an age of perhaps 300,000 years ago. There were also very crude flint implements (or eoliths). But the teeth are human teeth, and the jaw seems transitional between that of an anthropoid ape and that of man. Thus there was no chin. According to most authorities the lower jaw from the Heidelberg sand-pit must be regarded as a relic of a primitive type off the main line of human ascent.
[Ill.u.s.tration: A RECONSTRUCTION OF THE JAVA MAN.
(Pithecanthropus erectus.)]
3. It was in all probability in the Pliocene that there took origin the Neanderthal species of man, h.o.m.o neanderthalensis, first known from remains found in 1856 in the Neanderthal ravine near Dusseldorf. According to some authorities Neanderthal man was living in Europe a quarter of a million years ago. Other specimens were afterwards found elsewhere, e.g. in Belgium ("the men of Spy"), in France, in Croatia, and at Gibraltar, so that a good deal is known of Neanderthal man. He was a loose-limbed fellow, short of stature and of slouching gait, but a skilful artificer, fashioning beautifully worked flints with a characteristic style. He used fire; he buried his dead reverently and furnished them with an outfit for a long journey; and he had a big brain. But he had great beetling, ape-like eyebrow ridges and ma.s.sive jaws, and he showed "simian characters swarming in the details of his structure." In most of the points in which he differs from modern man he approaches the anthropoid apes, and he must be regarded as a low type of man off the main line. Huxley regarded the Neanderthal man as a low form of the modern type, but expert opinion seems to agree rather with the view maintained in 1864 by Professor William King of Galway, that the Neanderthal man represents a distinct species off the main line of ascent. He disappeared with apparent suddenness (like some aboriginal races to-day) about the end of the Fourth Great Ice Age; but there is evidence that before he ceased to be there had emerged a successor rather than a descendant--the modern man.
4. Another offshoot from the main line is probably represented by the Piltdown man, found in Suss.e.x in 1912. The remains consisted of the walls of the skull, which indicate a large brain, and a high forehead without the beetling eyebrows of the Neanderthal man and Pithecanthropus. The "find" included a tooth and part of a lower jaw, but these perhaps belong to some ape, for they are very discrepant. The Piltdown skull represents the most ancient human remains as yet found in Britain, and Dr. Smith Woodward"s establishment of a separate genus Eoanthropus expresses his conviction that the Piltdown man was off the line of the evolution of the modern type. If the tooth and piece of lower jaw belong to the Piltdown skull, then there was a remarkable combination of ape-like and human characters. As regards the brain, inferred from the skull-walls, Sir Arthur Keith says: All the essential features of the brain of modern man are to be seen in the brain cast. There are some which must be regarded as primitive. There can be no doubt that it is built on exactly the same lines as our modern brains. A few minor alterations would make it in all respects a modern brain.... Although our knowledge of the human brain is limited--there are large areas to which we can a.s.sign no definite function--we may rest a.s.sured that a brain which was shaped in a mould so similar to our own was one which responded to the outside world as ours does. Piltdown man saw, heard, felt, thought, and dreamt much as we do still.
And this was 150,000 years ago at a modern estimate, and some would say half a million.
There is neither agreement nor certainty as to the antiquity of man, except that the modern type was distinguishable from its collaterals hundreds of thousands of years ago. The general impression left is very grand. In remote antiquity the Primate stem diverged from the other orders of mammals; it sent forth its tentative branches, and the result was a tangle of monkeys; ages pa.s.sed and the monkeys were left behind, while the main stem, still probing its way, gave off the Anthropoid apes, both small and large. But they too were left behind, and the main line gave off other experiments--indications of which we know in Java, at Heidelberg, in the Neanderthal, and at Piltdown. None of these lasted or was made perfect. They represent tentative men who had their day and ceased to be, our predecessors rather than our ancestors. Still, the main stem goes on evolving, and who will be bold enough to say what fruit it has yet to bear!
[Ill.u.s.tration: After a model by J. H. McGregor.
PROFILE VIEW OF THE HEAD OF PITHECANTHROPUS, THE JAVA APE-MAN--AN EARLY OFFSHOOT FROM THE MAIN LINE OF MAN"S ASCENT.
The animal remains found along with the skull-cap, thigh-bone, and two teeth of Pithecanthropus seem to indicate the lowest Pleistocene period, perhaps 500,000 years ago.]
[Ill.u.s.tration: From the reconstruction by J. H. McGregor.
PILTDOWN SKULL. THE DARK PARTS ONLY ARE PRESERVED, NAMELY PORTIONS OF THE CRANIAL WALLS AND THE NASAL BONES.
Some authorities include a canine tooth and part of the lower jaw which were found close by. The remains were found in 1912 in Thames gravels in Suss.e.x, and are usually regarded as vastly more ancient than those of Neanderthal Man. It has been suggested that Piltdown Man lived 100,000 to 150,000 years ago, in the Third Interglacial period.]
[Ill.u.s.tration: Reproduced by permission from Osborn"s "Men of the Old Stone Age."
SAND-PIT AT MAUER, NEAR HEIDELBERG: DISCOVERY SITE OF THE JAW OF HEIDELBERG MAN.
a-b. "Newer loess," either of Third Interglacial or of Postglacial times. b-c. "Older loess" (sandy loess), of the close of Second Interglacial times. c-f. The "sands of Mauer." d-e. An intermediate layer of clay.
The white cross (X) indicates the spot at the base of the "sands of Mauer" at which the jaw of Heidelberg was discovered.]
Primitive Men.
Ancient skeletons of men of the modern type have been found in many places, e.g. Combe Capelle in Dordogne, Galley Hill in Kent, Cro-Magnon in Perigord, Mentone on the Riviera; and they are often referred to as "Cave-men" or "men of the Early Stone Age." They had large skulls, high foreheads, well-marked chins, and other features such as modern man possesses. They were true men at last--that is to say, like ourselves! The spirited pictures they made on the walls of caves in France and Spain show artistic sense and skill. Well-finished statuettes representing nude female figures are also known. The elaborate burial customs point to a belief in life after death. They made stone implements--knives, sc.r.a.pers, gravers, and the like, of the type known as Pal-olithic, and these show interesting gradations of skill and peculiarities of style. The "Cave-men" lived between the third and fourth Ice Ages, along with cave-bear, cave-lion, cave-hy-na, mammoth, woolly rhinoceros, Irish elk, and other mammals now extinct--taking us back to 30,000-50,000 years ago, and many would say much more. Some of the big-brained skulls of these Pal-olithic cave-men show not a single feature that could be called primitive. They show teeth which in size and form are exactly the same as those of a thousand generations afterwards--and suffering from gumboil too! There seems little doubt that these vigorous Pal-olithic Cave-men of Europe were living for a while contemporaneously with the men of Neanderthal, and it is possible that they directly or indirectly hastened the disappearance of their more primitive collaterals. Curiously enough, however, they had not themselves adequate lasting power in Europe, for they seem for the most part to have dwindled away, leaving perhaps stray present-day survivors in isolated districts. The probability is that after their decline Europe was repeopled by immigrants from Asia. It cannot be said that there is any inherent biological necessity for the decline of a vigorous race--many animal races go back for millions of years--but in mankind the historical fact is that a period of great racial vigour and success is often followed by a period of decline, sometimes leading to practical disappearance as a definite race. The causes of this waning remain very obscure--sometimes environmental, sometimes const.i.tutional, sometimes compet.i.tive. Sometimes the introduction of a new parasite, like the malaria organism, may have been to blame.
After the Ice Ages had pa.s.sed, perhaps 25,000 years ago, the Pal-olithic culture gave place to the Neolithic. The men who made rudely dressed but often beautiful stone implements were succeeded or replaced by men who made polished stone implements. The earliest inhabitants of Scotland were of this Neolithic culture, migrating from the Continent when the ice-fields of the Great Glaciation had disappeared. Their remains are often a.s.sociated with the "Fifty-foot Beach" which, though now high and dry, was the seash.o.r.e in early Neolithic days. Much is known about these men of the polished stones. They were hunters, fowlers, and fishermen; without domesticated animals or agriculture; short folk, two or three inches below the present standard; living an active strenuous life. Similarly, for the south, Sir Arthur Keith pictures for us a Neolithic community at Coldrum in Kent, dating from about 4,000 years ago--a few ticks of the geological clock. It consisted, in this case, of agricultural pioneers, men with large heads and big brains, about two inches shorter in stature than the modern British average (5 ft. 8 in.), with better teeth and broader palates than men have in these days of soft food, with beliefs concerning life and death similar to those that swayed their contemporaries in Western and Southern Europe. Very interesting is the manipulative skill they showed on a large scale in erecting standing stones (probably connected with calendar-keeping and with worship), and on a small scale in making daring operations on the skull. Four thousand years ago is given as a probable date for that early community in Kent, but evidences of Neolithic man occur in situations which demand a much greater antiquity--perhaps 30,000 years. And man was not young then!
[Ill.u.s.tration: PAINTINGS ON THE ROOF OF THE ALTAMIRA CAVE IN NORTHERN SPAIN, SHOWING A BISON ABOVE AND A GALLOPING BOAR BELOW The artistic drawings, over 2 feet in length, were made by the Reindeer Men or "Cromagnards" in the time of the Upper or Post-Glacial Pleistocene, before the appearance of the Neolithic men.]
We must open one more chapter in the thrilling story of the Ascent of Man--the Metal Ages, which are in a sense still continuing. Metals began to be used in the late Polished Stone (Neolithic) times, for there were always overlappings. Copper came first, Bronze second, and Iron last. The working of copper in the East has been traced back to the fourth millennium B.C., and there was also a very ancient Copper Age in the New World. It need hardly be said that where copper is scarce, as in Britain, we cannot expect to find much trace of a Copper Age.
The ores of different metals seem to have been smelted together in an experimental way by many prehistoric metallurgists, and bronze was the alloy that rewarded the combination of tin with copper. There is evidence of a more or less definite Bronze Age in Egypt and Babylonia, Greece and Europe.
It is not clear why iron should not have been the earliest metal to be used by man, but the Iron Age dates from about the middle of the second millennium B.C. From Egypt the usage spread through the Mediterranean region to North Europe, or it may have been that discoveries made in Central Europe, so rich in iron-mines, saturated southwards, following for instance, the route of the amber trade from the Baltic. Compared with stone, the metals afforded much greater possibilities of implements, instruments, and weapons, and their discovery and usage had undoubtedly great influence on the Ascent of Man. Occasionally, however, on his descent.
Retrospect.
Looking backwards, we discern the following stages: (1) The setting apart of a Primate stock, marked off from other mammals by a tendency to big brains, a free hand, gregariousness, and good-humoured talkativeness. (2) The divergence of marmosets and New World monkeys and Old World monkeys, leaving a stock--an anthropoid stock--common to the present-day and extinct apes and to mankind. (3) From this common stock the Anthropoid apes diverged, far from ign.o.ble creatures, and a humanoid stock was set apart. (4) From the latter (we follow Sir Arthur Keith and other authorities) there arose what may be called, without disparagement, tentative or experimental men, indicated by Pithecanthropus "the Erect," the Heidelberg man, the Neanderthalers, and, best of all, the early men of the Suss.e.x Weald--hinted at by the Piltdown skull. It matters little whether particular items are corroborated or disproved--e.g. whether the Heidelberg man came before or after the Neanderthalers--the general trend of evolution remains clear. (5) In any case, the result was the evolution of h.o.m.o sapiens, the man we are--a quite different fellow from the Neanderthaler. (6) Then arose various stocks of primitive men, proving everything and holding fast to that which is good. There were the Pal-olithic peoples, with rude stone implements, a strong vigorous race, but probably, in most cases, supplanted by fresh experiments. These may have arisen as shoots from the growing point of the old race, or as a fresh offshoot from more generalised members at a lower level. This is the eternal possible victory alike of aristocracy and democracy. (7) Pal-olithic men were involved in the succession of four Great Ice Ages or Glaciations, and it may be that the human race owes much to the alternation of hard times and easy times--glacial and interglacial. When the ice-fields cleared off Neolithic man had his innings. (8) And we have closed the story, in the meantime, with the Metal Ages.
[Ill.u.s.tration: After the restoration modelled by J. H. McGregor.
PILTDOWN MAN, PRECEDING NEANDERTHAL MAN, PERHAPS 100,000 TO 150,000 YEARS AGO]
[Ill.u.s.tration: After the restoration modelled by J. H. McGregor.
THE NEANDERTHAL MAN OF LA CHAPELLE-AUX-SAINTS.
The men of this race lived in Europe from the Third Interglacial period through the Fourth Glacial. They disappeared somewhat suddenly, being replaced by the Modern Man type, such as the Cromagnards. Many regard the Neanderthal Men as a distinct species.]
It seems not unfitting that we should at this point sound another note--that of the man of feeling. It is clear in William James"s words: Bone of our bone, and flesh of our flesh, are these half-brutish prehistoric brothers. Girdled about with the immense darkness of this mysterious universe even as we are, they were born and died, suffered and struggled. Given over to fearful crime and pa.s.sion, plunged in the blackest ignorance, preyed upon by hideous and grotesque delusions, yet steadfastly serving the profoundest of ideals in their fixed faith that existence in any form is better than non-existence, they ever rescued triumphantly from the jaws of ever imminent destruction the torch of life which, thanks to them, now lights the world for us.
Races of Mankind.
Given a variable stock spreading over diverse territory, we expect to find it splitting up into varieties which may become steadied into races or incipient species. Thus we have races of hive-bees, "Italians," "Punics," and so forth; and thus there arose races of men. Certain types suited certain areas, and periods of in-breeding tended to make the distinctive peculiarities of each incipient race well-defined and stable. When the original peculiarities, say, of negro and Mongol, Australian and Caucasian, arose as brusque variations or "mutations," then they would have great staying power from generation to generation. They would not be readily swamped by intercrossing or averaged off. Peculiarities and changes of climate and surroundings, not to speak of other change-producing factors, would provoke new departures from age to age, and so fresh racial ventures were made. Moreover, the occurrence of out-breeding when two races met, in peace or in war, would certainly serve to induce fresh starts. Very important in the evolution of human races must have been the alternating occurrence of periods of in-breeding (endogamy), tending to stability and sameness, and periods of out-breeding (exogamy), tending to changefulness and diversity.
Thus we may distinguish several more or less clearly defined primitive races of mankind--notably the African, the Australian, the Mongolian, and the Caucasian. The woolly-haired African race includes the negroes and the very primitive bushmen. The wavy-to curly-haired Australian race includes the Jungle Tribes of the Deccan, the Vedda of Ceylon, the Jungle Folk or Semang, and the natives of unsettled parts of Australia--all sometimes slumped together as "Pre-Dravidians." The straight-haired Mongols include those of Tibet, Indo-China, China, and Formosa, those of many oceanic islands, and of the north from j.a.pan to Lapland. The Caucasians include Mediterraneans, Semites, Nordics, Afghans, Alpines, and many more.
There are very few corners of knowledge more difficult than that of the Races of Men, the chief reason being that there has been so much movement and migration in the course of the ages. One physical type has mingled with another, inducing strange amalgams and novelties. If we start with what might be called "zoological" races or strains differing, for instance, in their hair (woolly-haired Africans, straight-haired Mongols, curly-or wavy-haired Pre-Dravidians and Caucasians), we find these replaced by peoples who are mixtures of various races, "brethren by civilisation more than by blood." As Professor Flinders Petrie has said, the only meaning the term "race" now can have is that of a group of human beings whose type has been unified by their rate of a.s.similation exceeding the rate of change produced by the infiltration of foreign elements. It is probable, however, that the progress of precise anthropology will make it possible to distinguish the various racial "strains" that make up any people. For the human sense of race is so strong that it convinces us of reality even when scientific definition is impossible. It was this the British sailor expressed in his answer to the question "What is a Dago?" "Dagoes," he replied, "is anything wot isn"t our sort of chaps."
[Ill.u.s.tration: RESTORATION BY A. FORESTIER OF THE RHODESIAN MAN WHOSE SKULL WAS DISCOVERED IN 1921.
Attention may be drawn to the beetling eyebrow ridges, the projecting upper lip, the large eye-sockets, the well-poised head, the strong shoulders.
The squatting figure is crushing seeds with a stone, and a crusher is lying on the rock to his right.]
[Ill.u.s.tration: RESTORATION BY A. FORESTIER OF THE RHODESIAN MAN WHOSE SKULL WAS DISCOVERED IN 1921 The figure in the foreground, holding a staff, shows the erect att.i.tude and the straight legs. His left hand holds a flint implement.
On the left, behind the sitting figure, is seen the entrance to the cave. This new Rhodesian cave-man may be regarded as a southern representative of a Neanderthal race, or as an extinct type intermediate between the Neanderthal Men and the Modern Man type.]
Steps in Human Evolution.
Real men arose, we believe, by variational uplifts of considerable magnitude which led to big and complex brains and to the power of reasoned discourse. In some other lines of mammalian evolution there were from time to time great advances in the size and complexity of the brain, as is clear, for instance, in the case of horses and elephants. The same is true of birds as compared with reptiles, and everyone recognises the high level of excellence that has been attained by their vocal powers. How these great cerebral advances came about we do not know, but it has been one of the main trends of animal evolution to improve the nervous system. Two suggestions may be made. First, the prolongation of the period of ante-natal life, in intimate physiological partnership with the mother, may have made it practicable to start the higher mammal with a much better brain than in the lower orders, like Insectivores and Rodents, and still more Marsupials, where the period before birth (gestation) is short. Second, we know that the individual development of the brain is profoundly influenced by the internal secretions of certain ductless glands notably the thyroid. When this organ is not functioning properly the child"s brain development is arrested. It may be that increased production of certain hormones--itself, of course, to be accounted for--may have stimulated brain development in man"s remote ancestors.
Given variability along the line of better brains and given a process of discriminate sifting which would consistently offer rewards to alertness and foresight, to kin-sympathy and parental care, there seems no great difficulty in imagining how Man would evolve. We must not think of an Aristotle or a Newton except as fine results which justify all the groaning and travailing; we must think of average men, of primitive peoples to-day, and of our forbears long ago. We must remember how much of man"s advance is dependent on the external registration of the social heritage, not on the slowly changing natural inheritance.
Looking backwards it is impossible, we think, to fail to recognise progress. There is a ring of truth in the fine description aeschylus gave of primitive men that-- first, beholding they beheld in vain, and, hearing, heard not, but, like shapes in dreams, mixed all things wildly down the tedious time, nor knew to build a house against the sun with wicketed sides, nor any woodwork knew, but lived like silly ants, beneath the ground, in hollow caves unsunned. There came to them no steadfast sign of winter, nor of spring flower-perfumed, nor of summer full of fruit, but blindly and lawlessly they did all things.
Contrast this picture with the position of man to-day. He has mastered the forces of Nature and is learning to use their resources more and more economically; he has harnessed electricity to his chariot and he has made the ether carry his messages. He tapped supplies of material which seemed for centuries unavailable, having learned, for instance, how to capture and utilise the free nitrogen of the air. With his telegraph and "wireless" he has annihilated distance, and he has added to his navigable kingdom the depths of the sea and the heights of the air. He has conquered one disease after another, and the young science of heredity is showing him how to control in his domesticated animals and cultivated plants the nature of the generations yet unborn. With all his faults he has his ethical face set in the right direction. The main line of movement is towards the fuller embodiment of the true, the beautiful, and the good in healthy lives which are increasingly a satisfaction in themselves.
[Ill.u.s.tration: Photo: British Museum (Natural History).
SIDE-VIEW OF A PREHISTORIC HUMAN SKULL DISCOVERED IN 1921 IN BROKEN HILL CAVE, NORTHERN RHODESIA.
Very striking are the prominent eyebrow ridges and the broad ma.s.sive face. The skull looks less domed than that of modern man, but its cranial capacity is far above the lowest human limit. The teeth are interesting in showing marked rotting or "caries," hitherto unknown in prehistoric skulls. In all probability the Rhodesian man was an African representative of the extinct Neanderthal species. .h.i.therto known only from Europe.]
[Ill.u.s.tration: After the restoration modelled by J. H. McGregor.
A CROMAGNON MAN OR CROMAGNARD, REPRESENTATIVE OF A STRONG ARTISTIC RACE LIVING IN THE SOUTH OF FRANCE IN THE UPPER PLEISTOCENE, PERHAPS 25,000 YEARS AGO They seemed to have lived for a while contemporaneously with the Neanderthal Men, and there may have been interbreeding. Some Cromagnards probably survive, but the race as a whole declined, and there was repopulation of Europe from the East.]
[Ill.u.s.tration: Reproduced by permission from Osborn"s "Men of the Old Stone Age."
PHOTOGRAPH SHOWING A NARROW Pa.s.sAGE IN THE CAVERN OF FONT-DE-GAUME ON THE BEUNE.
Throughout the cavern the walls are crowded with engravings; on the left wall, shown in the photograph, are two painted bison. In the great gallery there may be found not less than eighty figures--bison, reindeer, and mammoths. A specimen of the last is reproduced below.]
[Ill.u.s.tration: A MAMMOTH DRAWN ON THE WALL OF THE FONT-DE-GAUME CAVERN.
The mammoth age was in the Middle Pleistocene, while Neanderthal Men still flourished, probably far over 30,000 years ago.]
[Ill.u.s.tration: A GRAZING BISON, DELICATELY AND CAREFULLY DRAWN, ENGRAVED ON A WALL OF THE ALTAMIRA CAVE, NORTHERN SPAIN.
This was the work of a Reindeer Man or Cromagnard, in the Upper or Post-Glacial Pleistocene, perhaps 25,000 years ago. Firelight must have been used in making these cave drawings and engravings.]
Factors in Human Progress.
Many, we believe, were the gains that rewarded the arboreal apprenticeship of man"s ancestors. Many, likewise, were the results of leaving the trees and coming down to the solid earth--a transition which marked the emergence of more than tentative men. What great steps followed?
Some of the greatest were--the working out of a spoken language and of external methods of registration; the invention of tools; the discovery of the use of fire; the utilisation of iron and other metals; the taming of wild animals such as dog and sheep, horses and cattle; the cultivation of wild plants such as wheat and rice; and the irrigation of fields. All through the ages necessity has been the mother of invention and curiosity its father; but perhaps we miss the heart of the matter if we forget the importance of some leisure time--wherein to observe and think. If our earth had been so clouded that the stars were hidden from men"s eyes the whole history of our race would have been different. For it was through his leisure-time observations of the stars that early man discovered the regularity of the year and got his fundamental impressions of the order of Nature--on which all his science is founded.
If we are to think clearly of the factors of human progress we must recall the three great biological ideas--the living organism, its environment, and its functioning. For man these mean (1) the living creature, the outcome of parents and ancestors, a fresh expression of a bodily and mental inheritance; (2) the surroundings, including climate and soil, the plants and animals these allow; and (3) the activities of all sorts, occupations and habits, all the actions and reactions between man and his milieu. In short, we have to deal with FOLK, PLACE, WORK; the Famille, Lieu, Travail of the LePlay school.
As to FOLK, human progress depends on intrinsic racial qualities--notably health and vigour of body, clearness and alertness of mind, and an indispensable sociality. The most powerful factors in the world are clear ideas in the minds of energetic men of good will. The differences in bodily and mental health which mark races, and stocks within a people, just as they mark individuals, are themselves traceable back to germinal variations or mutations, and to the kind of sifting to which the race or stock has been subjected. Easygoing conditions are not only without stimulus to new departures, they are without the sifting which progress demands.
As to PLACE, it is plain that different areas differ greatly in their material resources and in the availability of these. Moreover, even when abundant material resources are present, they will not make for much progress unless the climate is such that they can be readily utilised. Indeed, climate has been one of the great factors in civilisation, here stimulating and there depressing energy, in one place favouring certain plants and animals important to man, in another place preventing their presence. Moreover, climate has slowly changed from age to age.
As to WORK, the form of a civilisation is in some measure dependent on the primary occupations, whether hunting or fishing, farming or shepherding; and on the industries of later ages which have a profound moulding effect on the individual at least. We cannot, however, say more than that the factors of human progress have always had these three aspects, Folk, Place, Work, and that if progress is to continue on stable lines it must always recognise the essential correlation of fitter folk in body and mind: improved habits and functions, alike in work and leisure; and bettered surroundings in the widest and deepest sense.
BIBLIOGRAPHY.
DARWIN, CHARLES, Descent of Man. HADDON, A. C., Races of Men. HADDON, A. C., History of Anthropology. KEANE, A. H., Man Past and Present. KEITH, ARTHUR, Antiquity of Man. LULL, R. S., Organic Evolution. MCCABE, JOSEPH, Evolution of Civilization. MARETT, R. R., Anthropology (Home University Library). OSBORN, H. F., Men of the Early Stone Age. SOLLAS, W. J., Ancient Hunters and their Modern Representatives. TYLOR, E. B., Anthropology and Primitive Culture.
VI.
EVOLUTION GOING ON.
Evolution, as we have seen in a previous chapter, is another word for race-history. It means the ceaseless process of Becoming, linking generation to generation of living creatures. The Doctrine of Evolution states the fact that the present is the child of the past and the parent of the future. It comes to this, that the living plants and animals we know are descended from ancestors on the whole simpler, and these from others likewise simpler, and so on, back and back--till we reach the first living creatures, of which, unfortunately, we know nothing. Evolution is a process of racial change in a definite direction, whereby new forms arise, take root, and flourish, alongside of or in the place of their ancestors, which were in most cases rather simpler in structure and behaviour.
The rock-record, which cannot be wrong, though we may read it wrongly, shows clearly that there was once a time in the history of the Earth when the only backboned animals were Fishes. Ages pa.s.sed, and there evolved Amphibians, with fingers and toes, scrambling on to dry land. Ages pa.s.sed, and there evolved Reptiles, in bewildering profusion. There were fish-lizards and sea-serpents, terrestrial dragons and flying dragons, a prolific and varied stock. From the terrestrial Dinosaurs it seems that Birds and Mammals arose. In succeeding ages there evolved all the variety of Birds and all the variety of Mammals. Until at last arose the Man. The question is whether similar processes of evolution are still going on.