CHAPTER IX 



PARENTAL COLOUR 



A COMPARISON of the colour of parents and 

 young shows, that whereas young are almost 

 invariably protectively coloured, parents are 

 not uncommonly conspicuously coloured. 

 This difference in colour is explained by some, 

 who say that the protective colouring of young 

 animals is the colour of their ancestors, which 

 they must assume ^during development, be- 

 cause development reproduces the ancestry 

 of the species : and who say that protective 

 colouring must therefore be assumed, whether 

 beneficial or not : and who look upon the 

 conspicuous colouring of many adults as a 

 more recent added character. 



There is no doubt that an animal, during 

 development, does reproduce its ancestry, but 

 then there is no evidence that it must do so. 

 Not all the characters of its ancestors are 

 retained, but only a few : and of the few, many 

 do not attain to as high a development as 



