336 THE REDISCOVERED COUNTRY 



purpose of guiding myself and packhorse back to a sheep I 

 had killed. It took me a quarter of an hour to find that 

 handkerchief, simply because a queer combination of hght 

 and shade had temporarily made it absolutely invisible. 

 And certainly if a red bandana handkerchief is concealingly 

 coloured, then all objects in nature are so coloured. There- 

 fore I have scant patience with the type of argument in 

 rebuttal — on either side — that says in effect: "You say the 

 whiff enpoof is — or is not — protectively coloured. Now the 

 other day I was out, and I saw — or did not see — a whiffen- 

 poof, etc." That sort of argument is barred. It means 

 nothing. We are dealing with tendencies, not hard and fast 

 invariabilities. If protective coloration always worked, 

 the beasts would be always invisible. If we always saw 

 every creature, we would come precious close to om- 

 niscience. 



Let us now take up in detail the five items of theory, and 

 see how much or how little they are borne out by our own 

 observations. 



I. Countershading. Considered as a tendency, as a 

 fact, among others, that tends to render an animal less con- 

 spicuous than if he were a monochrome, I believe this idea 

 has merit. A countershaded object is in most circum- 

 stances less conspicuous than an object in monochrome. 

 A countershaded animal, afoot and in normal circum- 

 stances, is less easily picked out by the eye than an animal 

 not so countershaded. In other words, countershading 

 tends not so much to conceal an animal when he is aware of 

 danger and attempting to hide* as to cause him to be over- 

 *A hiding animal generally squats, thus concealing his light under parts. 



