Unimportance of Colour 
part due to the fact that many zoologists are 
content to study nature in museums rather 
than in the open. Some of those who observe 
organisms in their natural surroundings, especially 
in such favourable localities as the tropics, 
seem to be of opinion that natural selection 
has but little influence on the colouration of 
organisms. 
Thus D. Dewar writes (Al/any Review, 1907) : 
“Eight years of bird-watching in India have 
convinced me that, so far as the struggle for 
existence is concerned, it matters not to a bird 
whether it be conspicuously or inconspicuously 
coloured, that it is not the necessity for pro- 
tection against raptorial foes which determines 
the colouring of a species; in short, that the 
theory of protective colouration has but little 
application to the fowls of the air.” 
Similarly, F. C. Selous writes, on page 13 
of African Nature Notes and Remzntscences : 
“Having spent many years of my life in the 
constant pursuit of African game, I have cer- 
tainly been afforded opportunities such as have 
been enjoyed by but few civilised men of 
becoming intimately acquainted with the habits 
and life-history of many species of animals living 
in that continent, and all that I have learned 
during my long experience as a hunter compels 
me to doubt the correctness of the now very 
generally accepted theories that all the wonder- 
195 
