17 MARCH 1917, Page 22

Arboreal Man. By F. Wood Jones. (E. Arnold. 8s. 6d.

net.)— The direct ancestors of primitive man never went on all fours, but lived in trees. That is the theory which Professor Wood Jones demonstrates, by the aid of comparative anatomy, in this learned essay, pointing out especially that the fore-limb or arm of the higher mammals was never used merely for supporting the weight of the body. In climbing about trees, our ancestors learned to stand upright. " The human child sits up before it stands; the human stock sat up before it stood." The wilder peoples in Malaysia climb trees like monkeys, with their feet flat against the trunk and their arms round it. That is a survival, the author thinks, of skill acquired in the forests long ages since.