successive generation. Any one who reads these most
interesting chapters will admit, that the fact of the display is
demonstrated; and it may also be admitted, as highly probable, that the
female is pleased or excited by the display. But it by no means follows
that slight differences in the shape, pattern, or colours of the
ornamental plumes are what lead a female to give the preference to one
male over another; still less that all the females of a species, or the
great majority of them, over a wide area of country, and for many
successive generations, prefer exactly the same modification of the
colour or ornament.

The evidence on this matter is very scanty, and in most cases not at all
to the point. Some peahens preferred an old pied peacock; albino birds
in a state of nature have never been seen paired with other birds; a
Canada goose paired with a Bernicle gander; a male widgeon preferred a
pintail duck to its own species; a hen canary preferred a male
greenfinch to either linnet, goldfinch, siskin, or chaffinch. These
cases are evidently exceptional, and are not such as generally occur in
nature; and they only prove that the female does exert some choice
between very different males, and some observations on birds in a state
of nature prove the same thing; but there is no evidence that slight
variations in the colour or plumes, in the way of increased intensity or
complexity, are what determines the choice. On the other hand, Mr.
Darwin gives much evidence that it is _not_ so determined. He tells us
that Messrs. Hewitt, Tegetmeier, and Brent, three of the highest
authorities and best observers, "do not believe that the females prefer
certain males on account of the beauty of their plumage." Mr. Hewitt was
convinced "that the female almost invariably prefers the most vigorous,
defiant, and mettlesome male;" and Mr. Tegetmeier, "that a gamecock,
though disfigured by being dubbed, and with his hackles trimmed, would
be accepted as readily as a male retaining all his natural
ornaments."[126] Evidence is adduced that a female pigeon will sometimes
turn antipathy to a particular male without any assignable cause; or, in
other cases, will take a strong fancy to some one bird, and will desert
her own mate for him; but it is not stated that superiority or
inferiority of plumage has anything to do with these fancies. Two
instances are indeed given, of male birds being rejected, which had lost
their ornamental plumage; but in