Alexandria gazette. [volume] (Alexandria, D.C.) 1834-1974, 1898-08-29
PROOFS OF MANS DESCENT.


A dispatch from London says: Two
international bodies which have been
sitting during the past week discussed
subjects OF general interest. One, the
Cambridge Congress of Zoology, was
remarkable for fascinating paper by
Prot. Haeckel on the worlds present
Snowledge of the descent of man. He
lid not hesitate to declare that science
nas now established the absolute cel-
teinly that man had descended through
various stages of evolution from the
oaess form of animal life during q
period estimated at thousand million
years.
This knowledge, which must now be
accepted SIS the croWning achievement
oi science during the nineteenth cen
tury, was won through recent discover, S
Of fossil remains in Java, Madagascar
aud Australia, and is made still ore
complete eviCeaoe by the availahl,
proof of discoveries where with D4rwih's 5
Isme is most commonly associated
Prof. Haeckel thus summarized the
,teps Of mans evolution
The mono phylesic ori! of all nam
MALTA, from lIoaoltrem ttA upwaid4 to
II 40, is no longer vague hypothesis,
vi an established fact. All the living
aud extinct mammal which we know
.re descended from single common.
ancestral form which lived in the tiia--
C, or the Perman, period, aad this
lrm must be derived from scme pc
mean or, perhaps, carboniiercu3 re.
lie, allied to progouousauria and theri-
dontia, which wss derived from cal-
ooniferous amphebian, or group OF
stegocepbala.
"These amphibians, in turn, descend
rom Devonian fishes and these gain
rom the lower vertebrates. The most
important fact is that man is primal e
mi that all primates, lemurs, mon
keys, autbropoid, apes and mac de
.cended from one common stem.
Looking forward to the twentieth
century, l am convinced that it will
universally accept our theory of de-
sceut. I have no doubt that the strong
Influence Of anthropogeny upon tn
1ther branches of science will be most
ruitful."
Oae member said that Prof. Haeckel
lad spoken of thousand million years
IS necessary for his evolution tree,
while Lord Kelvin supposed himself TO
aavs proved that this world, as the
scene of life, could not be more than
.wenty five million years old. II d d
1ot SEEM wise 10 complicate HaeckePs
theory by assuming that a thousand
million years were required for Il Q
proof.
Haeckel replied that the computa-
ton was not his own. He took the
time from one of the most eminent
biologists. For himself, be confessed
1e had no intuition as to the length OF
time.
The congress received and discussed
Haeckels paper with the greatest en-
thusiasm.
The other meeting was the institute
If international law at Hague, which
was attended by the most eminent au.
,horities of Europe, but the United
States was not represented. The pro-
ceedings were under the obvious shadow
of the gloom thrown by the recognized
clouds in the international sky.
President De Beaufort, the Dutch
foreign minister. pointed out the exist T.
ing contrast between the sympathy felt
for all efforts to bring nations into har-
mony and the actual practice which
tends to separate and isolate them. 1t
could not be denied, be said, that the
desire shown by almost all States to
render themselves independent of their
neie ehbors and insure monopolies TO
domestic pursuits and agriculture by as
far as possible excluding foreign prod
ucts did not tally with those sentiments
OF solidarity watch make agreement
among people on different points pos
sible.
But what was still more serious and
affec ed the object of such bodies as the
institute more materially, was the fe-
verish development among all civilized
nations of their armaments. Military and
naval budgets have become the night
mares of ministers of finance. While
the last twenty-five years had been, tc
a certain extent, period of peace, ar
mics and fleets had grown out of all
proportion to those of the commence
ment of the century.
When war was the order oi
the day, friends of peace re-
garded with anxiety these i'm
mense armies, these gigantic arse
mails filled with engines OF destruction
We were told they were pledge O
peace, but in any case these meaDs O.
defense developed to such a degree O.
perfection denoted the feeling of mu'
tual distrust and showed that the VIC
lent fear of solution intensely occuple
mems minds. The events OF the las'
few months had afforded the unwel
come certainty that this fear was Only
too we'll founded. The recent war mac
been q painful! surprise for all state S
men and a great Encouragement ioi
the institute. The speaker. neverthe
less, found consolation in the TACT ina
| both thu United States and SPAN
though not parties to the declaration o
Paris, had observed its rules.
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