57o THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY 



of weakness. Also, being falsely based, they have needed props and 

 dikes at one point after another, and these have naturally proved to be 

 out of harmony with each other. Here it has been assumed that ani- 

 mals need badges for mutual recognition, and there, as in the " mimetic " 

 groups, a theory has obtained which assumed that they need nothing of 

 the kind. Individuals of each species of these groups have been ex- 

 pected to know each other amidst a crowd of close imitations (and 

 doubtless they could do so). 



The much insisted upon significance of the superficiality of the 

 resemblances among the "mimetic" groups vanishes upon our discov- 

 ery of a full blown use, of the most direct and primitive character, for 

 all these colorations. From that moment, these resemblant costumes 

 are seen to be, as I have pointed out, on one basis with the many other 

 resemblances among species of widely different origin that have long 

 enough had the same habits and environment. All these, and they are 

 to be found in many orders of the animal kingdom, are only superficial 

 resemblances, yet it is perfectly plain that they have been acquired for 

 a use. The proof that they are only superficial is that the anatomist can 

 discover the real pedigree of the disguised species by an examination of 

 the elements of its structure. Good examples of this fact are the 

 whales and seals, with their hind legs more or less arranged into a fish- 

 tail, yet perfectly recognizable by the zoologist. (I assume the truth of 

 natural selection.) 



In fine to imagine that the forest population, living side by side, in 

 perpetual need of knowing each other, would be in any way helped by 

 badges, is as if some person, newly arrived in a long-established com- 

 munity, supposed, because he could only distinguish its members by 

 prominent superficial marks, the red hair of one, the pock marks of 

 another, etc., that this was how the members themselves knew each 

 other, after lifelong familiarity. 



The truth, however, is, that were he to cite these distinguishing 

 marks, in speaking of one member to another, he would find that the 

 mutual familiarity of these members had become so subtile, had, so to 

 speak, sunk in so deep, that they had almost forgotten the existence of 

 such marks at all, except where men's names commemorated these. 



Lifelong members of a community, all reacting upon each other in 

 a hundred ways, know each other by innumerable means, all communi- 

 cating with their subliminal consciousness. To this consciousness, the 

 movements, for instance, of a mink in the bushes, probably announce 

 his identity to all his neighbors, who hear him, just as plainly as if tbey 

 saw him, and the least glimpse of him would, upon the same principle, 

 be as good as a full view. Habitual woodsmen generally tend to believe 

 this, because of finding that they themselves tend to this intuitive 

 method of identifying their wild neighbors in the forest. 



