206 ROMANCE OF THE INSECT WORLD CHAP. 



objects, is rather to be accounted for by the laws of a 

 struggle for existence and survival of the fittest, while 

 the elements permitting the birth and progress of the 

 resemblance exist in the individual variability of the 

 species, a variability that is hereditary. 



The commonness of the occurrence of a general 

 resemblance or harmony of colouring between insects 

 and the prevailing tints of nature, a similarity in 

 general artistic effect, is hardly conceived by those 

 unaccustomed to watch or speculate upon such things 

 as these. In the different tribes, in the most adverse 

 orders, this kind of protection abounds, affording its 

 several possessors greater or less degree of invisibility 

 to the prying eyes of antagonists, or the fear-fraught 

 glance of the wished-for prey. 



In the tropics the colours of thousands of species, 

 though perhaps brilliant and far from being alike, blend 

 completely with the aspect of the spots where the 

 insects habitually repose. At a few feet distant the 

 surface and the insect may be absolutely indistinguish- 

 able. It is one thing to see an insect by itself in a 

 collector's cabinet, quite another matter to witness it 

 in the state in which it ordinarily exists. Seen apart 

 from its surroundings it may appear bright, and not 

 adapted to escape observation ; in its everyday haunts, 

 probably, that very brilliancy enhances its conceal- 

 ment. The truth is we fail adequately to appreciate 

 the tones of inanimate nature. We make little or 

 no allowance for the infinite complications wrought 

 by the ceaselessly changing play of light and shade 

 upon colours which in themselves are far from uniform. 

 A gaudy insect with numerous hues, if viewed in con- 



