414 SAVAGE SUDAN 



what dangers or under what conditions of danger are the 

 defenceless creatures supposed to require this protection? 

 An answer to that question must involve consideration of the 

 general conditions that govern the " struggle for existence " in 

 African forest and veld ; in short, a study of the psychology of 

 the wilderness. Thus, for example, before we can accept this 

 theory of colour-protection as presented, we must first con- 

 strain ourselves to regard the lion and his fellow-carnivores as 

 habitually rampaging far and wide in broad daylight, instinct 

 to kill at sight from sheer blood-lust, and customarily charging 

 herds of herbivores from untold distances. That, of course, may 

 be the popular view and reads so pretty. Those, however, who 

 have studied the lion in life know that such ideas are merely 

 fabled fallacies not to say romantic rubbish. By day the big 

 carnivores are not beasts-of-prey at all ; that function they 

 confine to the night when colour counts not, and when scent 

 leads them to their prey. On the rare occasions when herds 

 of antelopes or zebras do perhaps once in their lifetimes 

 chance to set eyes on a disturbed lion astir in daylight, no sign 

 of alarm do they evince ; no panic seizes them, nor (so far as 

 we can judge) do they recognise in the unwonted apparition 

 however near an enemy at all. Some watch with curious 

 eyes ; others continue grazing. I assume, of course, that the 

 " wind " is right. 1 



One point in this controversy demands clear emphasis at the 

 outset. In the main, those who uphold this theory of colour- 

 protection are (if that be the right term) "cabinet-naturalists" 

 many of them men of high intellectual and scientific attain- 

 ments, of broad views, but of comparatively limited field- 

 experience. While the opposition, with a few notable 

 exceptions, consists of a handful of humble field-observers, 

 unknown in the scientific world, but who eschew theory and 

 draw their deductions at first-hand from the life. 2 



1 Cases in point are given in the present work at pp 67, 104, 174-75 ; also 

 in On Safari, pp. 124-25. 



2 The few exceptions include F. C. Selous, whose African Nature Notes 

 and Reminiscences contain two chapters on this subject which deserve to be 

 read and read again by all who wish to master its complexities ; and, 

 secondly, Theodore Roosevelt, who kindly sent me his article " Revealing 

 and Concealing Coloration in Birds and Mammals," published in the Bulletin 



