THE LARKS 207 



sphere and a burning sun. On the other hand, those which haunt very 

 humid areas have acquired an extremely dark livery, which, in certain 

 cases, as of the skylark in the Roman Campagna, may be called 

 melanic. 1 



Whatever the hue, it is commonly supposed to have been evolved 

 to afford protection from enemies, to serve the purpose of a mantle of 

 invisibility : and the pallid coloured desert dwelling forms have been 

 used time out of number to demonstrate the truth of this view. Liv- 

 ing where cover in the shape of vegetation is at best but scanty, it is 

 assumed that "natural selection" has, on the one hand, gradually 

 weeded out the typical, darker, forms, and, on the other, encouraged 

 the survival of those individuals which inherently were less pigmented, 

 and thus, in course of time, the pallid forms came into being. The 

 agents at work in effecting this transformation have been, it is con- 

 tended, carnivores, winged and four-footed. But it would seem 

 rather that the governing factor is to be sought for, as we have already 

 hinted, in the physical rather than the animate environment. All 

 the same, this pale hue, in this milieu, materially lessens the chances 

 .of death by enabling the birds to escape their many foes : dark-coloured, 

 they would inevitably have been wiped out, and the deserts now 

 enlivened would have been tenantless. 



It is difficult to think of the skylark without thinking also of its 

 song. Fervid and impassioned, this strangely beautiful melody has 

 inspired some of the finest prose and poetry to be found in our 

 language : so much, indeed, has been written on this theme, that the 

 barest summary thereof would be wearisome in its length : nor would 

 such a summary serve any useful purpose, for the enthralling strains 

 are beloved of us all. It may be heard wellnigh the year round, yet 

 it would seem to be subject to a certain periodicity. A few of the 

 more vigorous birds begin, as it were, to tune up during the second 

 week in January, and from the end of this month to the end of July, 

 save during inclement weather, it may be heard almost the whole day 



1 Whitaker, Birds of Tunisia, vol. i. p. 270. 



