MIMICEY. 129 



" So the wise Hares 

 Oft quit their seats, lest some more curious eye 

 Should mark their haunts, and by dark treacherous wiles 

 Plot their destruction."— (« The Chase,' Book II.).* 



The test of protection is concealment from the keen search of 

 enemies, not merely an assimilative process, as noted by casual 

 observers. Of course a partial concealment is a partial protec- 

 tion, but it is difficult to see how this applies to the Hare, and in 

 the Transvaal, where most of these lines were written, I found it as 

 foolish an animal, and one as easy to discover and shoot, as in 

 England. Dietrich de Winckell, who according to Prince Kro- 

 potkin " is considered to be among the best acquainted with the 

 habits of Hares, describes them as passionate players, becoming 

 so intoxicated by their play that a Hare has been known to take 

 an approaching Fox for a playmate." f Describers are often 

 carried away by their enthusiasm for the theory of mimicry and 

 give their pens great licence. Thus, Dr. Meyer, speaking of the 

 neighbourhood of Kilima-njaro, writes : " The insects, too, have 

 their ' magic mantle ' of invisibility. No wonder it is difficult to 

 make a collection, when the Butterflies and Crickets look like 

 leaves and dry blades, the Cicadse like leaf-stems, the Spiders 

 like thorns, the Phasmodese like bare twigs, the Beetles like 

 stones and bits of earth, the Moths like mosses and lichens." % 

 Much, very much, has been made of the mimetic resemblance of 

 the upper surface of Flatfishes to the bottom on which they 

 rest. Mr. C. L. Jackson has given the result of a most interest- 

 ing experiment he made by placing a number of small Flatfish in 

 a tank which contained ten or twelve large Cod averaging fully 

 twenty pounds weight each. These at once dashed after the 

 Flatfish, " which instantly covered themselves with sand and 

 apparently disappeared. The Cod, however, knew better. They 

 commenced to hunt for them, carefully and systematically 

 quartering their ground as a well-trained pointer would do, and 

 affording a beautiful illustration of the use of the curious ' beard ' 

 possessed by many members of the Cod family. By-and-by, 

 one of them, by means of this feeler, detected one of the 



* Cf. C. C. Coe, • Nature versus Natural Selection,' p. 184. 

 | ' Nineteenth Century,' vol. xxviii. p. 706. 

 I ' Across East African Glaciers,' p. 80. 

 Zool. 4th ser. vol. IV., March, H<00. k 



