Warning Colouration 



words of Wallace, " important that they should 

 not be mistaken for defenceless or eatable species 

 of the same class or order, since in that case 

 they might suffer injury, or even death, before 

 their enemies discovered the danger or the use- 

 lessness of the attack. They require some 

 signal or danger-flag which shall serve as a 

 warning to would-be enemies not to attack them, 

 and they have usually obtained this in the form 

 of conspicuous or brilliant colouration, very dis- 

 tinct from the protective tints of the defenceless 

 animals allied to them " {Darwinism, page 



232 ). 



For examples of so-called warningly coloured 

 animals, we may refer the reader to Wallace's 

 Darwinism, Poulton's Essays on Evolution, or 

 Beddard's Animal Colouration. An instance 

 familiar to all is our English ladybird. " Lady- 

 birds," says Wallace, " are another uneatable 

 group, and their conspicuous and singularly 

 spotted bodies serve to distinguish them at a 

 glance from all other beetles." 



In order to establish the theory of warning 

 colouration, it is necessary to prove that all, or 

 the great majority of conspicuously-coloured 

 organisms, are either unpalatable or mimic 

 unpalatable forms. If this be so, we are able 

 to understand that the possession of gaudy 

 colouring may be of advantage to the individual. 

 But even if this be satisfactorily proved, we 



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