The silver messenger. (Challis, Idaho) 1890-1912, 1899-10-17

a great deal of skill snd it affords an
excellent example Ct his power as a
logician, but TO some it seems to land
him, when carried to its ultimate con-
clusion, in an untenable position. The
appearance of Weismanns book In
1882, announcing his germ plasm"
hypothesis, and asserting the non-in-
heritability of acquired characters
which would. If proved. be fatal to
Cope's hypothesis. in no way discon-
certed him, and the controversy be-
tween the Weismannians. mostly Ger
mans; the Darwinians, mostly Eng
lish, and the Neo-Lamarckians, mostly
Americans. still goes on.
Perhaps Professor Cope's most i'm
most indebted for his reputation. and
portant work-that to which he is
which at the same time shows to the
best advantage his varied qualifica-
tlons, accuracy of observation, nicely
OF comparison, powers of generaliza-
tion and general mental grasp-was in
the working out of the lines of descent
OF. organic forms. phylogenesis.
1t is only possible here to indicate
some of these. Among them may be
mentioned the tracing of all the orders
OF reptiles down to an order, CotyIo-.
saur1a, which, with another order.
Theromora, inhabited the earth during
the Permian epoch, and which ap-'
proaches structurally the Batrachia.
and at the same time presents charac-
tiers that render it probable that ali
otner reptiles derive their being from
them. The descent of the camels from
the lower Miocene Poebrotherium. and
that OF the horses from the four-toed
Hyracotherium of the Eocene, the two
most perfect lines yet deciphered. he
was also largely instrumental in soIv-
ing. The universally of the trituber-
culate molar, which may prove to be
the key to mammalian phylogeny. was
another of his inductions. Probably
the most interesting of all was that
which parallels a discovery in another
line OF science, namely, that of the
discovery of the planet Neptune by
Gale on the calculations and predie-
lions of Leverrier.
In this case the prediction was made
that a fve-toed plantigrade animal
would be found that would satisfy all
the conditions, structural and geologi-
cal, necessary to the ancestral type of
the hoofed animals, and was verified
by the discovery, in the Eocene forma-
ton of Wyoming, of Phenacodus, de-
-
which he has with two other fossil
animals included in his order Con-
dylarthra, which he regarded as the
ancestral order for the Diplarthra
(hoofed animals) Proposcidia (ele-
phants); Toxodontia (Toxodonts); Hy-
racoidea (Hyraces), and Anthropoldea
monkeys, apes and mani. He also
showed the afinities between this or
der, Condylarthra, and another order,
Creodontia, which he considers the
parent stock of the unguiculate (claw-
ed animals, which indicate the June
ton of the two lines, in some form yet
to be found lower down geologicaIly.
The amount of work, research and
study necessary to the unraveling of
these questions, it is hard to convey an
idea of, but when it is remembered that
fossil remains are rarely found, and
those that furnish links in a phylo-
genetic chain still more rarely, some
idea may be formed of the patience and
perseverance required.
Only those VINO knew Professor Cope
in his work can fully appreciate what
his loss means to the world of learning.
A mind richly stored with facts known
to no one else and endowed with quail
ties capable of making the best use OF
them, untimely ended at an age of ma
tured judgment. is truly a calamity.