GENERA!. Al )ArTA TK ).\S :]|;) 



they appear to percoivo (lifTcrciicfs wlicn- wc j.. re. nc cnlour, 

 but it has not hoen ))!•(. vcd liow far tlii- iMi-ccption cxtfinU, 

 since in the most intollii^^cnl «»f tlu'sc, (|(i«:> and horses, the 

 sense of smell is so highly developed as for many purposes to 

 take the place of vision. 



It is a very suggestive fact that tho tlioory of tlie develop- 

 ment of the colour-sense through its utility, receives least s\ij>- 

 port from those animals Avhich are nearest to us, and from 

 which we have been corporeally developed — the niannnals; 

 rather more support from those which have had a \vi(hdy dif- 

 ferent origin — the birds ; and apparently most from tlioso 

 farthest removed from us — the insects, for whom it has been 

 claimed that we owe them all the floral beauty of the vege- 

 table kingdom, through their refined perception of ditTerences 

 of form and colour. This seems to me to be a kind of 

 redudio ad dbsurdum, and to constitute a disproof of that 

 whole argument as a final cause of the colour-sense. On the 

 other hand, it gives the strongest support to the view that the 

 refined perception and enjo\inent of colour ive possess has 

 not, and could not have been developed in us by its survival- 

 value in our early struggle for existence, but that these faculties 

 are, as Huxley remarked in reirard to his eniovment of scenerv 

 and of music, ^^ gratuitous gifts,'' and as such are powerful 

 arsninients for ^' a benevolent Author of the Universe/' * 



iSee Darwinism (3rd ed. 1901), p. 478, Appendix. 



