'"i.ii.; Barbour, Tin Cam oj Roosevell vs. Thayer, 



85 



We have been advised by Mr. Allen thai ridicule is a powerful 

 weapon and sorely as we are tempted, we are trying to 1< < •< -| > away 

 from iliis sharp-cutting blade. When Mr. Allen says, "the fact 

 thai Mr. Thayer may have been mistaken in regard to the habital 

 of the Peacock does n<>i vitiate all <>l' his experiments," li<' should 

 have added, trulj it does not, yel ii certainly does vitiate the one 

 i Inn had to do with the /'''/roc/-, and this was nil thai we expected 

 it to <l". We must take a crack al the now famous Blue Jay, and 

 his shadow on the snow. The jays are a tropical family, species of 

 jays with blue or green coloration occur wide-spread in both tropi- 

 cal and temperate regions. The Florida Blue Jay is almost exactly 

 similar in plumage to the species hereabouts. It lives where there 

 is no snow, :ts does our Blue Jay ;i lull half of the year. We are 

 frank to admil thai our Blue Jays hereabouts do occasionally 

 match the shadows on the snow if seen in exactly tlie righl posi- 



ti hut 'common sense' tells us thai tins Fad has absolutely 



no biological significance whatever. In regard to the white rump 

 of the deer, I must add just this suggestion to what may be said 

 regarding deer and their enemies. Deer are hunted by wolves 

 more than by other species of animals. Wolves hunt in pucks. 

 The deer's white rump might, under certain rather rare circum- 

 stances, Tool one wolf oul of ;i pack for a short moment during the 

 pack's pursuit. It mighl al vastly rarer intervals Tool all the indi- 

 viduals of the pack were all their eyes at the righl level al exactly 

 the righl time, l»ut thai it could Tool all the members of a keen- 

 uosed pack of hungry wolves long enough to allow of the fleer's 

 escape is again a matter where I think 'common sense' must, 

 certainly be called in. Personally I have experimented with 



captive deer under wild conditions; /. c. in a large park. I have 



had excellent o| (port ii ni t y for observing them carefully under 



many conditions with Mr. Thayer's theories in mind. I have also 



had color varieties of the European fallow <U'i'\-, which were both 



counter shaded and solid colored, some pure white, some deep 

 chocolate brown all over, and some with hrown hacks shading to 



lighl bellies. In every case, the solid colored, chocolate hrown 



individuals were the most dilliciilt to see, especially at dusk, the 



regular time when the wild deer begin to move aboul and Iced. 



Mr. Allen backs water very hard when he says, of the possibility 



