The Birmingham age-herald., 1924-01-05
PRESIDE SCIENCE
THE HAUNT OF TFB

THE HAUNT OF THE DRY LAND
 The ancestral lines of all land ami mals lead back to the sea. although the immediate ancestors of mammals and birds were land-roving reptiles. The ancestors of the reptiles, how ever, were water-born amphibians and the earliest amphibians were only modified fishes. That mankind's remote ancestors were marine crea- lures is evidenced by vestigial struc- lures, such as (a) the gili-clefts on the sides of an unborn baby's neck, which disappear before birth; Cb) three little bones inside the drum of the ear. called the hammer. anvil and stirrup, which have ceased 10 serve any purpose in man but which still function in the framework of fishes jaws, and (c) all the salts found in the ocean are also found in the mammalian blood in about the same proportions.
 As tadpoles, born in water, have learned to live as frogs on land and as the robber-crab is today learning lieve our remote ancestors responded, little by little. age after age, to the allurements of the land.
 The first forests consisted of water weeds, for in the lowest levels of life's geologic formations only fossil seaweeds are found. Plants first in- vaded the land, then the animals fol- lowed, certain insects and amphibians being the first to emerge. Besides the robber-crab, tAere are many kinds of aquatic creatures now learning to live on land. The principal change an aquatic organism had to make in order to live on land was to modify air bladders into lungs, and this we may see tadpoles doing in the aquarium. What a reptile had to ao to become a mammal was to change sweat glands into milk glands. and egg-laying organs into organs for monotremes, which came immediately after the egg-laying reptiles. laid half-hatched eggs; after the mono tremes came the pouched animals, which brought forth their young com pletely matched but in very pre- mature condition; then came the mammals.
 Birds solved the problem in another way: Instead of developing internal organs for bringing forth their young alive they learned to build nests, and q birds nest Is nothing more or less than an external womb wherein the eggs are matched and the immatur, young made ready for their life work.
 When reptile mothers began keep ing an eye on their nestless eggs, mother-love began to bud in the brain. That fierce, ennobling passion did not begin to dominate the female brain, however, until the dawn of the Eocene time, where mammals first appeared in the jungles. Feeding live born cubs at their breasts, man. nal mothers learned to love them. to fight for them and, if need be. to die for them. To kidnap cubs from any kind of a mammal mothers lair is dangerous business. Presently the sons as well as the daughters of those early mammals began to inherit the mothers love of young, and out of that inheritance. the affection of the father for his cubs has grown. It is fierce affection, almost as self sacrificing as the mothers.
 Parental love of young gave rise to mammalian families. Wherever in the wilds you find mammals, you will find them during the breeding season living in families-well de- fined families among the carnivores. When the she-wolf takes to her lair the he-wolf does the hunting, and the two, working together as mates. pro- tect and train their young. If the cubs become too playful or too ven- turesome they receive their maulings the same as unruly children.
 Among grazing animals, particu- larly deer, domestic life has taken an Oriental turn. A stag rounds up as many females as he can keep to- gether and defend, but each fall tine family breaks up. 8s>
 Bull seals also play the' part of sultains, and the only way an ann bilious bachelor can found a faimly Is through the overthrow of one of the established sultans.