But the first trials of the system were conducted at Newport, in 1913, in conjunction with Lieutenant Kenneth Whiting, of the submarine flotilla. After a period experiments were continued at the Brooklyn Navy Yard. In 1915 Commander J. O. Fisher, U.S.N., painted the periscope of his submarine--the K-6--with the colors of the spectrum. Mr. Mackay got in touch with this officer and explained the work he had done with Lieutenant Whiting. Fisher, deeply interested, invited the painter to deliver a series of lectures to the officers of the submarine flotilla at the Brooklyn Navy Yard. With the aid of a Maxwell disk--a wheel upon which colored cardboard is placed and then revolved--he demonstrated the difference between paint and light, as set forth in a book on the chemistry of color by the late Ogden N. Rood, of Columbia. He showed, for example, that yellow and blue in light make white, while yellow and blue in pigment make green. The bird colored blue and yellow will be a dull gray at a distance of 100 feet, and will blend perfectly against the dull gray of a tree-trunk at, perhaps, a less distance. The parrot of red, green, and violet plumage turns gray at 100 feet or more, the eye at that distance losing the ability to separate the three color-sensations. It is upon this principle, then, that ships painted in several varieties of tints and shades form combinations under different lights that cause them to waver and melt into the sea and sky. They _seem_ to melt, to be more explicit, because the craft so painted is surrounded by tints and shades that are similar to those employed in painting the craft. Vessels thus painted, as seen at their docks, present a curious aspect. At their water-lines, and running upward for perhaps twenty feet, are green wave-lines, and above, a dappled effect of red, green, and violet, which involve not only the upper portions of the hull, but the life-boats, masts, and funnels. This, then, as said, was the American idea as first applied by Mr. Mackay, and which would have been greatly amplified had not listening devices been so perfected as to render it unnecessary for the Germans to see until their quarry was so near, say a mile or two, that no expedient in the way of low visibility would serve. It was then that our navy, which had been following experiments in camouflage, accepted the dazzle system for some of its transports, while retaining the leaden war-paint for other transports and for fighting craft.