64 CHILDHOOD OF ANIMALS 



of a girl until it becomes a wonder and a delight, but it ran no less 

 red for countless generations under the thick and hairy hide of the 

 apes that were her ancestors. The little shining grains that we 

 call pearls are diseases of the shell-fish in which they are formed. 

 Undoubtedly there is a reason for it, but who shall say that there 

 is a purpose in the males of the eclectus parrots being green whilst 

 the females are red ? The truth is that living things must have 

 colour and pattern whether these be directly useful to them or no. 



Even the untrained eye 

 at once picks out fossils 

 in a slab of rock or 

 shells lying on the sea- 

 shore, and identifies' 

 them as having be- 

 longed to living things, 

 because their patterned 

 surface is in contrast 

 with the formless mono- 

 tony of the surround- 

 ing matter. Pattern is 

 essentially repetition of 

 parts. If we stand in 

 a hall of mirrors and 

 look at the endless 

 images of ourselves re-' 



FIG. 20. Repetition Pattern obtained by tearing fleeted from mirror to 

 holes in a sheet of folded paper and then mirror We shall find 

 unfolding it. 



that we and these 



multiplications of our body compose a pattern. Similarly in 

 the scientific toy known as a kaleidoscope, a few fragments of 

 coloured tinsel and glass are dropped into a cardboard tube with 

 a glass bottom surrounded by a circle of little mirrors. When we 1 

 look through the tube against the light the duplications and 1 

 reduplications of the fragments form a-n elaborate pattern which 

 changes into a new complexity as we revolve or shake the tube. 

 If we take a sheet of thin paper and fold it first into two and then 

 into four, then double it diagonally from the central corner, then 

 tear, however roughly, a few holes in the folded edges, we shall 

 find on unfolding it again that we have formed a symmetrical 

 pattern, radiating from the centre of the sheet (Fig. 20). If we 

 take another sheet of paper, fold it across so as to make a guiding 



