AMONG THE FLAMINGOES. 113 



to general, and to demonstrate that this Darwinian princi- 

 ple is generally operative in ornithic coloration. Whether 

 birds in general have or have not aesthetic tastes in the 

 matter of coloration or ornament, we are not prepared to 

 say : but to our less imaginative minds it is a question 

 whether there exists in nature a shred of real evidence in 

 support of such a hypothesis. The flamingo truly has a 

 brilliant plumage, but never a brilliant environment. No 

 one who has been intimately acquainted with these birds 

 in their haunts could have conceived such a sentiment ; for 

 anything less brilliant than the bleak and tawny monotony 

 which characterizes the chosen homes of the flamingo it 

 would be impossible to imagine. The flamingo itself, 

 indeed, is the one solitary speck of pure bright colour 

 amidst the broad leagues of mud and muddy water which 

 it so conspicuously ornaments. Other birds are there, it is 

 true, but to them the same remark applies. They, also, 

 are as bright, pure and conspicuously different from their 

 environment as are the flamingoes. What more exquisite 

 examples of bright, spotless beauty amidst strongly con- 

 trasted surroundings than the stilts and avocets, the lovely 

 southern herons, egrets and spoonbills, the gulls and 

 marsh-terns? These are but a handful of examples 

 fatal to such a theory, and they could easily be multiplied 

 indefinitely. 



That many brilliant bird-forms affect brilliant surround- 

 ings, that the fauna of the cold and colourless north in 

 general lacks the gorgeous hues of certain denizens of the 

 tropics, or, again, that many creatures possess hues assimi- 

 lated to the general tone of their destined haunts — all 

 these are facts which we readily recognize. But are such 

 facts much more than coincidences ? Or is it wise to 

 deduce any binding rules or axiom therefrom ? As regards 

 protective assimilation in colour, that is quite a different 

 thing : its advantages are self-evident, and its application 

 more or less universal throughout the animal- world, but it 

 is hardly to the point. Protective coloration we recognize 

 and understand — it is an every-day phenomenon — but 

 aesthetic tastes in colour we utterly reject. 



i 



