Publisher's Synopsis
This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can usually download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1873 edition. Excerpt: ... 134 PART III. Having completed our survey of certain characters presented by the skeleton in different species of the order Primates, other systems of organs may now be adverted to. That system of parts which clothes and is attached to the various parts of the skeleton may be taken naturally after the skeleton itself. This system consists of the flesh, which, being divided into a number of segments and layers by intervening membrane, constitutes the muscles, or active organs of motion. The muscles, however, present few characters of any great value for our purpose; and this might be anticipated, since, being the special organs of motion, they would naturally be expected to be peculiarly modifiable and to present every variety of adaptive modification. Speaking generally, the apes resemble man myologically more than do the Half-apes, and the latter may present us with special aberrant modifications; such, e.g., as the presence of an extra muscle, called rotator fibidce, placed between the shin-bone (tibia) and the adjacent small bone (fibula) of the leg. It is the group of latisternal apes (Simiince) which approach man most closely in muscular structure, as we have seen they do in the bony framework which supports the muscles. Amongst these higher apes the Orang shows again a certain inferiorit7-as to its muscles, reminding us of the aberrations we have already seen to exist in its skeleton Thus in its foot, the great toe, in spite of its small relative size, is furnished with a special short muscle (called opponens haUucis) not found in other latisternal apes, any more than in man. This, indeed, is a special development, and is no approximation to an inferior type of structure. On the contrary, both the great toe and the thumb have no...
