Note g — BOOK IV. (continued 2)

The Camelion is sufficiently fam’d on this Account. Besides which, Pliny tells us of a Beast as big as an Ox, called the Tarandus, that when he pleaseth, assumes the Colour of an Ass, and Colorem omnium fruticum, arborum, florum, locorumgue reddit, in quibus latet metuens, ideoque rarò capitur. Plin. l. 8. c. 34.

How true this is, there may be some Reason to doubt; but if any Truth be in the Story, it may be from the Animal’s chusing such Company, or Places, as are agreeable to its Colour: As I have seen in divers Caterpillars, and other Insects, who I believe were not able to change their Colour, from one Colour to another; yet I have constantly observ’d, do fix themselves to such Things as are of the same Colour; by which Means they dodge the Spectator’s Eye. Thus the Caterpillar that feeds on Elder, I have more than once seen, so cunningly adhering to the small Branches of the same Colour, that it might be easily mistaken for a small Stick, even by a careful View. So a large green Caterpillar, that feeds on Buckthorn, and divers others. To which I may add the prodigious Sagacity of the Ichneumon Flies, that make the Kermes, (for of that Tribe all the Kermes I ever saw was;) how artificially they not only inclose their Eggs within that gummy Skin, or Shell; but also so well humour the Colour of the Wood they adhere to, by various Streaks and Colours, that it is not easie to distinguish them from the Wood it self.