THE UTILITY OF PHOSPHORESCENCE IN DEEP- 
SEA ANIMALS. 
Ge C: NUTIING: 
In a paper entitled “ The Color of Deep-Sea Animals,” read 
at the last meeting of the Iowa Academy of Sciences, I brought 
together a number of facts tending to show that the actual 
quantity of phosphorescent light emitted by animals of the 
deep sea was very considerable; so great, indeed, as to supply 
over definite areas of the sea bottom a sufficient illumination to 
render visible the colors of the animals themselves. If this 
be true, we have an explanation of the colors themselves 
along the same lines as are adopted in discussions of animal 
coloration in general. Coloration is practically meaningless in 
the absence of sufficient light to make colors visible. Having 
explained the colors of deep-sea forms by demonstrating a light 
in the depths sufficient to render visible the prevailing bright 
colors, z.e., reds, yellows, and greens, of the animal inhabitants, 
it is interesting, and may be profitable, to seek an answer to 
the question: ‘Of what profit is the phosphorescence to its 
possessors ? ” 
I must confess to having scant sympathy with those natural- 
ists who delight in demonstrating, to themselves at least, the 
falsity of the good old Darwinian dictum that “ every character 
possessed by an animal is of use to the species, or was of use 
to its ancestors.” Men nowadays are willing to assert boldly 
that certain characters of animals are “meaningless.” 
For instance, Beddard, in his Animal Coloration, p. 37, says: 
« The inevitable conclusion, therefore, from these facts appears 
to be that the brilliant and varied colorations of deep-sea ani- 
mals are totally devoid of meaning. They cannot be of advan- 
tage for protective purposes, or as warning colors, for the 
single and sufficient reason that they are invisible.” 
793 
