The Appeal. [volume] (Saint Paul, Minn. ;) 1889-19??, 1899-10-21

the United States. Not the most ancient
ancestor by any means, for there were
others back millions Of years before his
time, even to the dear old thing scientists
| refer to as the primal ungulate, who was
| the father of countless children many of
whom are not now on speaking terms.
! They have scattered as widely as the
| twelve tribes of Israeli but their history
| Is more definite. But the mesophippus
| shows distinctly what the horse used to
| be. He is link in long chain.
The Primate Ungulates split in two
| nine million years ago, more or less, just
| as large aggregates of humans resolve
| into small aggregated They split on a
question of style in toes. One branch in
| sisted on an even number. while the other
would wear an odd number. Some of old
! Primate's children tried to compromise.
| They grew an even number of toes on the
| front feet and al odd number on the
] hind feet, which indicates a worthy effort
| to straddle-on their part-but straddlers
| did not effect much. They were not part
| of the game. The result was that each
! of the two branches-the perissodactyls,
| or odd-toed, and the artiodactyls or even
| toed--went it's way fulfilling the require
| nen'ts of its destiny with inevitableness.
| Every million years or so there was
another split. Families divided and d.
vided on all sorts of questions such as
Shall we live in the valley?
Shall we live in the mountains?
Shall we live in the swamps? 5@
Shall we I've in the woods?
Shall we live on the plains?
Shall we live in the water?
Shall we live half in half out of the
| water? 'z..s = - -
Shall we eat soft food?
Shall we eat hard food? I'D
Shall we be smaller?
Shall we be larger? <sz .,.s .
Shall we drop a toe? ~ IT.
Shall we grunt? -
/ Snail we below?
Shall we neigh? II (
Shall we roar? .t.-
Shall we carry trunks: and so it went
like religious sects, though with less acri-
mony.
The result was a diversity that kept
Adam busy all one morning. There were
oxen antelope, deer, hogs hippopotami,
elephants, rhinoceroses, tapirs and horses
The chart of descent from Old Primal az
Professor Geikie has drawn 1t 70 shown
in the cut. "a
These animals are blood relationships
Isins. AS to toes. the elephant and the
coryphodon have five on each foot, the
rh1noceros, the tapir and the palaeothere3
have three toes on each, and the horse
has one, while hogs and hippopotami
have four, and oxen, deer, other ruuni-
N~s~~~SS
horse has been dropping toes, or it would
be more accurate to say he has been
working them up his legs, Slipping them
into his sleeves like a prestidigitateur
every thousand centuries or oftener. The
founder Of his house whom scientific folk
recognize as the head OF the family,
though not much larger than. muskrat,
had twenty toes, five on each foot. That
was before the tertiary stage.
AS the tertiary got under way toes :iis-
appeared. The bones dug up out in the
middle West show this. Enough have
come to light to make q complete series !
of horses from the present day back to
the time Of four toes, with a metacarpal
splint, or rl1dftr,eratary@foe,es then held to
In fond memory Of Old Primus. But the
hind feet changed more quickly than the |
fore, having more to do. The Oldest fos-
sill horse fragments, those OF the early /
eocene period, show the father Of the |
Brooklyn handicap with eight toes on his |
fore feet and only six on his after, maxi i
II fourteen in all. while splints like 4
thumbs on Cew claws showed whittier |
the missing digits had gone.
The. next batch of remains chronology |
cally speaking, show the orohippus (said 1
to be Greek for mountain horse) without |
the rudimentary splint. Later, in meso- |
hppus, the fourth toe is up sleeve,
showing only splint. Then the milo |
hippus has Its middle toe elongated, and
a toe on each side that were useful after |
a rain, when the ground wss marshy, |
but were Of no service at all on asphalt |
pavements, as they hung too high AS
phalt or other hard surface being round |
IN those days, the middle toe developed
strength. while the outer toes dwindled !
through lack Of use. The two leg bones
united though they showed distinctly. !
From the size Of fox to that Of a sheep.
1t came to be as large as an ass. Except !
In the shape of the skull and the hoof |
and in the lergth of the molars there was
nothing to differentiate It from the plio-
hippus-the true horse. In the quarter
nary epoch the hoof rounded, the molars
Grew longer, the side bones grew more
together and the splint bones shortened
This was the horse as men know him I
to-day, when he is rapidly Transforming
into electricity and compressed air.