his own views. Moreover, the untenabieness of the mim- 

 icry hypothesis must have revealed itself very clearly to 

 him in the course of his investigations regarding the col- 

 oring of butterflies. Mimicry, as our readers are well aware, 

 consists in this, that living beings imitate other organisms 

 cr even inanimate objects; Darwinism maintains that this 

 is done for the sake of protection against enemies. This 

 phenomenon is said to have been produced by selection 

 Those animals that possessed, for instance, some similarity 

 to a leaf, in consequence escaped their enemies more easily 

 than others and survived, while those that had no leaf- 

 like appearance succumbed; when this process had been 

 repeated a few times, many animals (butterflies) gradually 

 developed that marvelous leaf-Hke appearance, which fre- 

 quently deceives the most practiced eye. 



It appears so simple and natural that one need not 

 wonder that this peculiar phenomenon gained many an ad- 

 herent for Darwinism. But, of course, it is directly op- 

 posed to the views of Eimer; and it is for this reason that 

 he endeavors' so assiduously to disprove the error of Dar- 

 winism in this regard. As the underlying color design of 

 the butterfly Eimer designates eleven longitudinal designs; 

 and the examination of the leaf-like forms leads him to the 

 conclusion, that their appearance always depends on "the 

 unaltered condition or the greater prominence of certain 

 parts of this fundamental design." There is to be observed 

 a shifting of the third band, so that in conjunction with the 

 fourth, which is curved, it forms the mid-rib of the leaf. 

 Eimer finds the cause of this phenomenon in the alteration 



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