82 CONTROLLED NATURAL SELECTION 



the theory of sexual selection explains or 

 correlates, else it could never have been con- 

 ceived. Nevertheless much has been written 

 against sexual selection, especially in Germany 

 and America, and a general demand made for 

 another explanation. 1 There are other theories. 

 Wallace explains the dull dresses of female 

 birds and insects by supposing that the young- 

 producing females require better protection 

 than the males. But one would think that if 

 dull plumes are an advantage to the female 

 they would also be of use to the male, and 

 that therefore he would don them too. This 

 theory of Wallace apparently comes very near 

 to the one under description, but in reality it 

 is almost the converse. The new theory states 

 that the male becomes brilliant in colour in 

 order that he may be more likely to be 

 destroyed : and thus the dull-coloured female 

 gain protection. In Wallace's theory the 

 female becomes altered for her sake, in this 

 theory the male for the female's sake. Wallace 



1 The author's theory is not, strictly speaking, antagonistic to 

 Sexual Selection, but only in so far that such selection cannot 

 be for the purpose of gratifying the female's sense of beauty. 

 The new theory is quite able to embrace female selection 

 provided they instinctively select males which will be more 

 attractive to enemies than males in general ; for instance, con- 

 spicuously coloured males as against beautiful males. 



