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Hence, perhaps, the reason why white appears more frequently in islands where competition is less severe and enemies less numerous and varied. Hence, also, a reason why albinoism, although freely occurring in captivity, never maintains itself in a wild state, while melanism does.

Some curious instances have been related of an infant with a two-colored face, and of others with one side of the face white and the other black; whether they were cases of partial albinism or partial melanism cannot be ascertained from the descriptions.

Looking to the cases which I have collected of cross-bred animals closely resembling one parent, the resemblances seem chiefly confined to characters almost monstrous in their nature, and which have suddenly appeared such as albinism, melanism, deficiency of tail or horns, or additional fingers and toes; and do not relate to characters which have been slowly acquired by selection.

It is characterized by the presence in the tissues and skin of an excessive amount of pigment. True total melanism is unknown in man, in whom is only observed partial melanism, characterized simply by a pronounced coloration of part of the integument.

The white elephant is celebrated in the religious history of Oriental nations, and is an object of veneration and worship in Siam. White monkeys and white roosters are also worshiped. In the Natural History Museum in London there are stuffed examples of albinism and melanism in the lower animals. Melanism is an anomaly, the exact contrary of the preceding.

Melanism, the opposite of albinism, is rarer, and the only instance I have seen was that of a black bullfinch at Aldington; it had evidently been mobbed as a stranger by other birds of its kind, as it was injured and nearly dead when captured. I had the specimen stuffed as a curiosity, though I am not fond of stuffed birds.

Eventually I heard of the phenomenon of melanism in animals, less rare in snakes perhaps than in animals of other classes, and I was satisfied that the problem was partly solved. My serpent was a black individual of a species of some other colour. But it was not one of our common species-not one of those I knew.

The other cases of this interesting exhibit show a large variety of birds and animals under conditions of somewhat abnormal variation, in the one case of albinism and the other of melanism. These cases are, for the casual visitor, perhaps the most striking of all, although, of course, they teach no such comprehensive lessons as the other exhibits just referred to.

A new feeling about snakes Common snakes of the country A barren weedy patch Discovery of a large black snake Watching for its reappearance Seen going to its den The desire to see it again A vain search Watching a bat The black serpent reappears at my feet Emotions and conjectures Melanism My baby sister and a strange snake The mystery solved.

Looking to the cases which I have collected of cross-bred animals closely resembling one parent, the resemblances seem chiefly confined to characters almost monstrous in their nature, and which have suddenly appeared such as albinism, melanism, deficiency of tail or horns, or additional fingers and toes; and do not relate to characters which have been slowly acquired through selection.