F. C. Selous Quoted 
African War that on overcast or moonless nights 
the nearly black army great-coat made a picquet 
sentry invisible at a distance of a few feet. In 
strong moonlight this garb could be seen at a 
great distance, whereas a khaki pea jacket, use- 
less on a dark night, answered the requirements 
of invisibility very well.” It is thus evident 
that the dark colour of the buffalo and sable 
antelope cannot be protective on both dark and 
moonlight nights. 
The theory of protective colouration is based 
on the tacit assumption that beasts of prey rely 
on eyesight for finding their quarry. Raptorial 
birds certainly do use their eyes as the means of 
discovering their victims; but the great majority 
of predaceous mammals trust almost entirely to 
their power of smell as a means for tracking 
down their prey. 
“ Nothing,” writes F. C. Selous, on page 14 of 
African Nature Notes and Reminiscences, “is 
more certain than that all carnivorous animals 
hunt almost entirely by scent until they have 
closely approached their quarry, and usually 
by night, when all the animals on which they 
prey must look very much alike as far as colour 
is concerned.” 
The herbivora—the quarry for the beast of 
prey—too, have a keen sense of smell, so that 
they trust their noses rather than their eyes for 
safety. 
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