MAMMALS. 



625 



It may have been a great advantage to the lion and puma,, 

 from the open nature of their usual haunts, to have lost 

 their stripes, and to have been thus rendered less con- 

 spicuous to their prey; and if the successive variations, by 

 which this end was gained, occurred rather late in life the 

 young would have retained their stripes, as is now the case. 



Fig. 72. Head of Semnopithecus rubicundus. This and the following figures 

 (from Prof. Gervais) are given to show the odd arrangement and develop- 

 ment of the hair on the head. 



As to deer, pigs and tapirs, Fritz Miiller has suggested to 

 me that these animals, by the removal of their spots or 

 stripes through natural selection, would have been less 

 easily seen by their enemies; and that they would have 

 especially required this protection as soon as the carnivora 

 increased in size and number during the tertiary periods. 

 This may be the true explanation, but it is rather strange 

 that the young should not have been thus protected, and 

 gtill more so that the adults of some species should have 



