“PUTTING ON PAINT AND FRILLS.” 49 
quivers the wing till the balls seem to dance in their 
sockets, perhaps resembling some seed shaking in its 
hull or some berry quivering in its husk, thus arous- 
ing pleasant associations, till the bird, like some others, 
loved her lover because he “looked nice enough to 
eat.” 
It is difficult, of course, to see how female choice 
should be so delicate as to be influenced by the finest 
shades of color and shape, as indicated in the forma- 
tion of these “eyes” in the pheasant’s tail or those in 
the tail of the peacock. Often, especially in such low 
birds as these, where splendor and weapons both pre- 
vail, the female seems quite indifferent while the bat- 
tle or display prevails, and she is won by the law of 
battle or persistence of pursuit alone. 
It may be that variations of color were set up 
originally (by laws that we do not understand) inde- 
pendent of any choice, and have been intensified rather 
by food, climate, health, and vigor generally, as we 
saw in the last chapter, until selection by the female 
of the brightest, healthiest, and most vigorous or suc- 
cessful in battle would tend to bring color onward in 
the males up to the point where it stood not as an ex- 
pression of beauty, but simply as the sign of all that 
was desirable in a wooer otherwise. 
It is well known, of course, that Mr. Darwin held 
that all these ornaments were brought about by the 
esthetic appreciation and choice of the female. This 
view is now rather generally accepted, but there are a 
few thinkers to whom it does not seem probable. This 
is no place for this discussion, for or against, but to 
