THE EXTINCT QUAGGA 259 
It was stated some years ago that zebras a short distance 
off were absolutely invisible in bright moonlight, and I 
have reason to believe that the same is to a great extent 
the case in sunlight. For some reason or other the species 
inhabiting the plains (not the mountains, be it observed) of 
South Africa have tended to discard this striped coloration, 
the southern race of Burchell’s zebra exhibiting the first, and 
the quagga the second stage in this transformation. In 
North Africa the transformation has been carried a stage 
farther, the wild asses of the Red Sea littoral having 
discarded their stripes almost completely in favour of a 
uniform grey or tawny livery. Inthis part of the continent 
there is now no trace of a transitional form, whatever may 
have been the case in the past, and we thus have the 
sharp contrast between the uniformly coloured wild asses 
of the coast of the Red Sea on the one hand, and the fully 
striped zebras of Abyssinia ~ d Southern Somaliland on 
the other. 
Whether there is anything in the climatic and other 
physical conditions of the plains of Cape Colony which 
renders a partially striped species less conspicuous than one 
in which the striping is fully developed, the disappearance of 
the quagga makes it now impossible to determine. But 
observation might advantageously be directed to the com- 
parative invisibility, or otherwise, of the wild asses of the 
Red Sea littoral and the fully striped zebras of the interior, 
and whether this would be affected in any degree by the 
transference of the one to the habitat of the other. What- 
ever be the explanation, the fact remains that at the 
opposite extremities of Africa some of the members of 
the equine tribe have developed a tendency to the replace- 
ment of a striped livery by one of a uniform and sober 
hue, and that in the south of the continent this tendency 
