426 PACKARD— ORIGIN OF MARKINGS OF ORGANISMS. [Dec. 2, 



elevated in the air evidently as a warning. I have noticed that it 

 is very difficult to distinguish the pattern while the insect is run- 

 ning, the general impression being merely that of a black body with 

 white spots. The same applies to the Cicindelidee and Carabidae, 

 which are all fast runners and most of them very difficult to distin- 

 guish /«/<?/' j*? in the field at first sight." Now we would inquire 

 whether we need to invoke so speculative a hypothesis as the 

 Miillerian one for these cases. Are they not almost exactly paralleled 

 by the spots and bands of animals of numerous other orders which 

 live exposed to the direct sunlight or to light and shade, such as the 

 day-flying insects of different orders, spiders, the exceptionally 

 marked rodents, myrmecophaga, chipmunk, zebra, African kudus, 

 the tiger, leopard and other cats ; in all these animals when run- 

 ning, leaping or flying the outlines of the body are rendered more 

 or less indistinct by the blending of the markings. The Miillerian 

 theory should either be extended to include all banded and spotted 

 animals or discarded. 



On PL XVIII, entitled '' Mashonaland insects of many orders 

 with Lycoid pattern and coloring, etc.," are sixty-two figures of 

 as many species — ** which live on flowers, are most conspicuous " — 

 all claimed to imitate Lycus, the species of which are distasteful, and 

 which presumably owe, according to the advocates of the Miillerian 

 theory, their origination and preservation to this cause. All the 

 insects on this plate have the same general yellowish- ochre hue, the 

 end of the body or of the wings tipped or colored dark brown ; a 

 selection is made of Coleoptera of different families, of various 

 heteropterous Hemiptera, of various Hymenoptera, such as species of 

 Cerceris, Pompilus, and slow-flying, strong-smelling ichneumons 

 (Bracon, etc.). How Pompilus, so amply equipped with its sting 

 for protection against birds and lizards, should enjoy immunity 

 from attack by its resemblance to a harmless beetle protected by 

 its bitter flavor is not clear. The great group of Pompilidae and 

 allies taken the world over vastly outnumber the few scattered 

 species of Lycus, so that in this case, as well as the carnivorous 

 Coleoptera mentioned, to assume, as the Miillerian theory does^ 

 that such great groups, or certain of them, have come into being 

 and maintain themselves by natural selection seems an unneces- 

 sary hypothesis. Are not the resemblances to a Lycus of the two 

 Zygsenids, which are paralleled by the American Lycomorpha, 

 simply cases of convergence due to similar heat, dryness and other 



