8. The existence of every transition between resemblance which 
is practically complete and resemblance which is so slight as to be 
even disputable, is exactly comparable with what may be observed 
in other modes of protection; as for instance in cryptic assimilation 
to the ground, leaves, twigs, bark or other indifferent objects. 
These matters, as has been so often stated, are relative. Probably 
no means of protection gives absolute security, but different grades 
exist; as indeed we should expect on any theory of evolution. And 
it is often observable that where one kind of protection is feeble, it 
is compensated for by excellence in another method. 
9. The fact that forms resembling each other may be severally 
common, is to some extent an objection to the application to such 
cases of the theory of BATES, which is usually considered to 
postulate the comparative scarcity of the mimic. It is, however, 
no obstacle in the way of synaposematism; for each accession of 
inedible individuals only tends to increase the common safety. 
10. So too, the fact, that the associations are connected with one 
another by intermediates, is consonant with the theory of natural 
selection; for these gradational forms may be looked upon in effect 
as sien-posts showing the course which the evolutionary process 
has taken. Their survival is quite explicable on the Müllerian 
theory; for 1f themselves distasteful, each transitional form would 
be capable of sharing protection with the nearly resembling forms 
on each side of it, and thus would be established a chain of 
mutually protective links, reaching from one inedible assemblage 
to another. 
I am not sanguine enough to suppose that everyone in my 
audience will agree with the interpretation of these phenomena, 
which I have ventured to advocate. I must be content with having 
tried to put the case of those theories, which seem to me to account 
for the facts better than any others that have yet been developed. 
And I would urge in conclusion, as I did at the outset, that the 
data, about which there should be no dispute, are interesting and 
curious in the highest degree. Any rival explanation, which neither 
neglects nor distorts the actual facts of the case, will deserve and, 
I am sure, will receive the closest attention of all scientific 
naturalists. 
