COLORATION OF GAME ANIMALS. 55 



were really protective in those days, for the majority are certainly not so now, and it 

 must also be proved that they used to be preyed upon by animals which hunted by 

 sight, unlike those of the present day. If the second proposition is to be upheld, 

 it appears necessary to prove that man has been a hunter on the face of the globe 

 long enough to permit of these changes taking place. In other words, it must 

 be proved that these great changes in coloration have come about in a comparatively 

 short period of time. 



It is also necessary to prove, in the latter eventuality, that the eyesight of 

 original man was very defective when compared to that of present-day man, or 

 that the character of the country and vegetation was very different. For very few of 

 the game can now be said to be in perfect harmony with their surroundings, and 

 they certainly do not baffle the human hunter versed in bushcraft. Considering man's 

 slow gait and the methods primitive man used in hunting, it seems as if quickness 

 of sight, scent, and hearing and a little intelligence are qualities all more useful 

 for the avoiding of arrow, drop spear, and pitfall than any combination of colours, 

 however wonderfully arranged. 



Game has only the leeward side on which to fear a foe, anything to windward 

 being automatically reported by scent. So game, in those days, had but to watch 

 this side and try to locate anyone's approach before bowshot range was reached, 

 generally under fifty yards, when its own overwhelmingly superior pace could have 

 soon put it out of danger, once the danger was detected. 



Last of all come animals which do not appear to go in for any sexual coloration, 

 nor can they possibly be considered in need of any protective coloration. Such are 

 the pachyderms. 



It is a fact that rhino often look like rocks, and, when they have been having 

 a mud bath, they look like red ant-hills ; and it is certain that elephant are often 

 hard to distinguish. If these were animals regularly preyed upon it would no doubt 

 be said that they were wonderful instances of protective coloration. As it is, 

 however, the most sanguine supporter of protective coloration could hardly assert 

 that these animals have assumed their present colour and the habit of mud-bathing 

 for the sake of protection against beasts of prey. Nor can it be said that they 

 are protected against man, for I think that geologists will admit that these and 

 similar animals wandered about primeval forests before man had assumed any 

 distinction as a hunter, in much the same garb as they do to-day. Yet has the 

 hunter been deceived into uncertainty as to whether a rhino was an ant-hill or vice 

 versa, almost as often as he has been similarly deceived with a common animal 

 like a hartebeest. 



