. The descent of man : and selection in relation to sex. Evolution; Natural selection; Heredity; Human beings. 440 The Desce?tt of Man. Past II The extremities of tlie longer secondary feathers which bear the perfect ball-and-socket ocelli, are peculiarly ornamented (fig. 61). The oblique longitudinal striiDes suddenly cease upwards and become confused; and above this limit the whole upper end of the feather ('/) is covered with white dots, sur- rounded by little black rings, standing on a dark ground. The oblique stripe belonging to the npjDermost ocellus {h) is barely represented by a very s
. The descent of man : and selection in relation to sex. Evolution; Natural selection; Heredity; Human beings. 440 The Desce?tt of Man. Past II The extremities of tlie longer secondary feathers which bear the perfect ball-and-socket ocelli, are peculiarly ornamented (fig. 61). The oblique longitudinal striiDes suddenly cease upwards and become confused; and above this limit the whole upper end of the feather ('/) is covered with white dots, sur- rounded by little black rings, standing on a dark ground. The oblique stripe belonging to the npjDermost ocellus {h) is barely represented by a very short iiTegular black mark ^^ ith the usual, curved, tranverse base. As tills stripe is thus abruptly cut off, we can perhaps under- stand from what has gone before, how it is that the upper thickened part of the ring is here absent; for, as before stated, this thickened part apparently stands in some relation with a broken prolonga- tion from the next higher spot. From the absence of the upper and thickened part of the ring, the uppermost ocellus, though perfect in all other respects, appears as if its top had been obliquely sliced off. It would, I think, perplex any one, who believes that the plumage of the Argus-pheasant was created as we now see it, to account for the imperfect condition of the uppermost ocellus. I should add that on tlie secondary wing- feather farthest from the body, all the ocelli are smaller and less perfect than on the other feathers, and have the upper part of the ring deficient, as in the case just mentioned. The imperfection here seems to be connected with the fact that the spots on this feather shew less tendency than usual to become confluent into stripes ; they are on the contrary, often broken up into smaller spots, so that two or three rows run down to the same Fi.;-. 61. Portion near summit of one of the secondary wing-feathers, bearing perfect ball-and-socket ocelli. a. Ornamented npper part. h. 13 i>permost, imperfect ball-and-so
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Keywords: ., bookcentury1800, bookdecade1870, booksubjecthumanbeings, bookyear
