414 TROPICAL NATURE 



Homer's time he had advanced to the imperfect discrimina- 

 tion of red and yellow, but no further ; the green of grass 

 and foliage or the blue of the sky being never once referred to. 

 These curious facts cannot, however, be held to prove so 

 recent an origin for colour -sensations as they would at first 

 sight appear to do, because we have seen that both flowers 

 and fruits have become diversely coloured in adaptation to 

 the visual powers of insects, birds, and mammals. Red 

 being a very common colour of ripe fruits which attract birds 

 to devour them and thus distribute their seeds, we may be 

 sure that the contrast of red and green is to them very well 

 marked. It is indeed just possible that birds may have a 

 more advanced development of the colour-sense than mam- 

 mals, because the teeth of the latter commonly grind up and 

 destroy the seeds of the larger fruits and nuts which they 

 devour, and which are not usually coloured ; but the irritat- 

 ing effect of bright colours on some of them does not support 

 this view. It seems most probable, therefore, that man's 

 perception of colour in the time of Homer was little if any 

 inferior to what it is now, but that, owing to a variety of 

 causes, no precise nomenclature of colours had become estab- 

 lished. One of these causes probably was, that the colours 

 of the objects of most importance, and those which were most 

 frequently referred to in songs and poems, were uncertain 

 and subject to variation. Blood was light or dark red, or 

 when dry, blackish ; iron was gray or dark or rusty ; bronze 

 was shining or dull ; foliage was of all shades of yellow, 

 green, or brown ; and horses or cattle had no one distinctive 

 colour. Other objects, as the sea, the sky, and wine, changed 

 in tint according to the light, the time of day, and the mode 

 of viewing them ; and thus colour, indicated at first by refer- 

 ence to certain coloured objects, had no fixity. Things which 

 had more definite and purer colours as certain species of 

 flowers, birds, and insects were probably too insignificant or 

 too much despised to serve as colour-terms ; and even these 

 often vary, either in the same or in allied species, in a manner 

 which would render their use unsuitable. Colour-names, 

 being abstractions, must always have been a late development 

 in language, and their comparative unimportance in an early 

 state of society and of the arts would still further retard their 



