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There are, however, several fine varieties of D. nobile more valuable than nobilius. D. n. Sanderianum resembles that form, but it is smaller and darker. Albinos have been found; Baron Schroeder has a beautiful example. One appeared at Stevens' Rooms, announced as the single instance in cultivation which is not quite the fact, but near enough for the auction-room, perhaps.
They are supposed to be merely varieties or albinos. When sharks are hooked and drawn on board a ship, the sucking-fishes that have been swimming around them will remain for days, and even weeks, following the vessel throughout all her courses. They can then be taken by a hook and line, baited with a piece of flesh; and they will seize the bait when let down in the stillest water.
On the way to the eastward they put in at the Samballoes, or islands of San Blas, to fill fresh water, and to buy fruit from the Indians. When the anchors held, the Indians came aboard with fruit, venison, and native cloth, to exchange for edged iron tools, and red and green beads. Among the women were a few albinos, who were said to see better in the dark than in the light.
But the man who wishes to study the active habits of the feline race, or the variety, albinos, must, indeed, be stirring at this hour. I dare say, there are men who prefer even looking at objects by twilight, for the simple reason, that they see better at that time of the day." "And is this the cause why you are so much abroad in the night?"
The third, had it been a horse, might have been described as a roan, the whole body being a pale reddish-brown, with a sprinkling of real white hairs on the back. All three animals were, in reality, albinos, having the light-colored iris of the eye, the white toe-nails, and the pink skin at the end of the trunk which distinguish the albino everywhere.
The garden was well kept and comparatively free from weeds. At first we wondered how this could be, till I remembered that the Kalubi, or someone, had told me that it was tended by the servants of the Mother of the Flower, who were generally albinos or mutes.
Twins are usually hailed with delight, because they swell the power of the family, though in some instances they are put to death. Albinos are valued, though their colour is not admired. If death occurs in a natural manner, the body is usually either buried in the village or outside.
We have here, I think, an example of the essential difference between mutations and somatic modifications. Absence of the gametic factor or factors for pigmentation results in albinism, and no amount of exposure to light produces pigmentation in albinos, e.g. albino Axolotls which are well known in captivity. Absence of light, on the other hand, prevents the development of pigment.
It is exceptional for the parents to be affected; but in a case of Schlegel, quoted by Crocker, the grandfather was an albino, and Marey describes the case of the Cape May albinos, in which the mother and father were "fair emblems of the African race," and of their children three were black and three were white, born in the following order: two consecutive black boys, two consecutive white girls, one black girl, one white boy.
And similarly, not long ago an account was published of an albino race somewhere in Canada which had acquired a special name. Perhaps it has been wiped out by this time by wider marriages, though these might be effected with greater difficulty by albinos than by six-fingered persons.
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