Characters as Adaptive and Specific. 273 



" superfluities." Without being actually deleterious, 

 " a large proportional number of specific characters," 

 whose utility is not apparent, raust a fortiori hdiVe. been 

 due to " individual variation," to '" general laws which 

 determine the production" of such characters — or, in 

 short, to some causes other than natural selection. 

 And this, I say, is a doctrine much more in harmony 

 with " Darwinism " than is the contradictory doctrine 

 which I am endeavouring to resist. 



But once again, and still more generally, after 

 saying of " the delicate tints of spring foliage, and the 

 intense hues of autumn," that "'as colours they are 

 unadaptive, and appear to have no more relation to 

 the well-being of plants themselves than do the 

 colours of gems and minerals," Mr. Wallace proceeds 

 thus : — 



"We may also include in the same category those algae 

 and fungi which have bright colours— the red snow of the 

 Arctic regions, the red, green, or purple seaweeds, the brilliant 

 scarlet, yellow, white or black agarics, and other fungi. All 

 these colours are probably the direct results of chemical com- 

 position or molecular structure, and being thus normal products 

 of the vegetable organism, need no special explanation from 

 our present point of view ; and the same remark will apply 

 to the varied tints of the bark of trunks, branches and twigs, 

 which are often of various shades of brown and green, or 

 even vivid reds and yellows'." 



Here, as Mr. Gulick has already observed, ' Mr. 



Wallace seems to admit that instead of useless specific 



characters being unknown, they are so common and 



so easily explained by ' the chemical constitution of 



the organism ' that they claim no special attention ^." 



* Darwinism, p. 302. 



^ American Journal of Science, Vol. XL. art. I. on The Inconsisiencits 

 of Utilitarianistn as the Exclusive Theory of Organic Evolution. 



II. T 



