212 AUTUMN AND WINTER 



evidence supplied by these three deer, and by various other 

 animals and birds, points rather to the spotted livery being 

 a primitive and imperfect design of very general occurrence, 

 out of which many species have emerged. The spotted type 

 of marking, as exemplified by the fallow deer, or panther, or 

 spotted hyaena, is supposed to protect its wearer by blending 

 with the chequered pattern of sunlight falling through 

 deciduous foliage. It would therefore be reasonable enough, 

 on the protective argument, for the fallow deer to lose its 

 spots in winter and adopt a plainer grey dress ; for the deci- 

 duous trees lose their leaves, and the chequer-pattern is 

 missing. It might be argued that the red deer and the roe 

 lost this pattern because they haunted forests chiefly con- 

 sisting of coniferous trees, in which the chequer-pattern 

 characteristic of deciduous woods was absent altogether. 

 This is only partly true at the present day ; and it is impossible 

 to determine what type of woodland was inhabited by the 

 red and roe deer while they were acquiring their present 

 colours. But whatever may be the precise protective value 

 for these two deer of their plain red and grey liveries, either 

 now or in times past, it does seem clear that they represent 

 Nature's perfected pattern, and that the spotted markings 

 are an earlier pattern which they have outgrown. 



