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1859
1860
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the 1859 1860 1861 1866 1869
one of the 1872

4 blocks not present in 1859 1860 1861 1866 1869; present in 1872
How curious it is, to give a subordinate though striking instance, that the hind-feet of the kangaroo, which are so well fitted for bounding over the open plains,— those of the climbing, leaf-eating koala, equally well fitted for grasping the branches of trees,— those of the ground-dwelling, insect or root-eating, bandicoots,— and those of some other Australian marsupials,— should all be constructed on the same extraordinary type, namely with the bones of the second and third digits extremely slender and enveloped within the same skin, so that they appear like a single toe furnished with two claws. Notwithstanding this similarity of pattern, it is obvious that the hind feet of these several animals are used for as widely different purposes as it is possible to conceive. The case is rendered all the more striking by the American opossums, which follow nearly the same habits of life as some of their Australian relatives, having feet constructed on the ordinary plan. Professor Flower, from whom these statements are taken, remarks in conclusion: "We may call this conformity to type, without getting much nearer to an explanation of the phenomenon;" and he then adds "but is it not powerfully suggestive of true relationship, of inheritance from a common ancestor?"

connexion 1859 1860 1861 1866
position or connexion 1869 1872

This resemblance is often expressed by the term "unity of type;" or by saying that the several parts and organs in the different species of the class are homologous. The whole subject is included under the general
term
name
of Morphology. This is the most interesting
departments
department
of natural history, and may
almost be
be
said to be its very soul. What can be more curious than that the hand of a man, formed for grasping, that of a mole for digging, the leg of the horse, the paddle of the porpoise, and the wing of the bat, should all be constructed on the same pattern, and should include
the same
similar
bones, in the same relative positions? Geoffroy St. Hilaire has
strongly insisted
insisted strongly
on the high importance of relative connexion in homologous
parts;
organs:
they
the
parts
parts
may
differ
change
to almost any extent in form and size, and yet
will
they always
they always
remain connected together in the same
invariable order.
order.
We never find, for instance, the bones of the arm and
fore-arm,
forearm,
or of the thigh and leg, transposed. Hence the same names can be given to the homologous bones in widely different animals. We see the same great law in the construction of the mouths of insects: what can be more different than the immensely long spiral proboscis of a sphinx-moth, the curious folded one of a bee or bug, and the great jaws of a beetle? — yet all these organs, serving for such
dif- ferent
widely different
different
purposes, are formed by infinitely numerous modifications of an upper lip, mandibles, and two pairs of maxillæ.
The same
Analogous
law
laws
governs
govern
the construction of the mouths and limbs of crustaceans. So it is with the flowers of plants.
Nothing can be more hopeless than to attempt to explain this similarity of pattern in members of the same class, by utility or by the doctrine of final causes. The hopelessness of the attempt has been expressly admitted by Owen in his most interesting work on the 'Nature of Limbs.' On the ordinary view of the
independent
inde- pendent