2 BUTTERFLIES IN DISGUISE 



eve of the publication of the " Origin of Species," 

 at the meeting of the British Association for the 

 Advancement of Science, in 1859, that the first 

 attempt was made to collect facts of this nature, and 

 to inquire into the laws which regulate them. At 

 this meeting the late Mr. Andrew Murray read a 

 paper upon the '' Disguises of Nature," in which 

 he showed that the most perfect imitation of in- 

 animate objects occurs, not rarely or exceptionally, 

 but in some groups so commonly that the want of 

 it might be regarded as the exception, and that the 

 concealment of the animal was the plain purpose 

 of the disguise. He confesses, however, that he 

 cannot tell what law has set in motion such end- 

 less provision of protection, and can only suggest 

 that it may be found in some force analogous to 

 the great law of attraction ; that " like draws to 

 like, or like begets like." 



The theory of natural selection, immediately 

 afterward proposed by Darwin, was the key to this 

 puzzle. Its use for this purpose by Bates, in 

 1862, was one of the earliest independent contri- 

 butions to the theory from new observations. 

 Buried in the depths of a special systematic 

 paper, there were presented by Bates some of the 

 most striking instances that are known of such 



