. Concealing-coloration in the animal kingdom; an exposition of the laws of disguise through color and pattern: being a summary of Abbott H. Thayer's discoveries. Animals; Camouflage (Biology). tures were purely and simply "colored like their surroundings" they would not be inconspicuous at all. This has already been explained by articles in several scientific and popular magazines, but the explanation must be repeated here in full for the benefit of those who have not seen the former expositions of the discovery. What people commonly fail to perceive in connection with this matter,
. Concealing-coloration in the animal kingdom; an exposition of the laws of disguise through color and pattern: being a summary of Abbott H. Thayer's discoveries. Animals; Camouflage (Biology). tures were purely and simply "colored like their surroundings" they would not be inconspicuous at all. This has already been explained by articles in several scientific and popular magazines, but the explanation must be repeated here in full for the benefit of those who have not seen the former expositions of the discovery. What people commonly fail to perceive in connection with this matter, is that the exposition is really that of a discovery, i. e., of an indis- putable optical fact, hitherto unnoticed, and not merely that of one more theory. It is the revelation of how animals' wonderful inconspicuousness in their normal haunts, recognized for centuries but in its essence never under- stood, is really achieved. That is, not a description of any course of evolution or process of pigmentation, but the revelation of the manner in which the existent system of coloration renders animals nearly invisible on their native heath. I will quote, with slight modifications, from the original article published in 1896, and from that published in Nature in 1902. "The newly-discovered law in its application to animals may be stated thus: Animals are painted by Nature darkest on those parts which tend to be most lighted by the sky's light, and vice versa. The accompanying diagram illustrates this ABC " Animals are colored by Nature as in A, the sky lights them as in B, and the two effects cancel each other, as in C. The result is that their grada- tion of light-and-shade, by which opaque solid objects manifest themselves to the eye, is effaced at every point, the cancellation being as complete at one 14. Please note that these images are extracted from scanned page images that may have been digitally enhanced for readability - coloration and appearance of t
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