multi-colored Terries and Fermies

[Wilmer Rivers]

About the colors of the Terries and Fermies in all printings of "The
Land Beneath the Ground": Having them appear in all the colors of the
rainbow (or at least all the colors available to the comic-book printers
of the time) doesn't really give me a problem.  You still have to refer
to their neckties to tell Terries from Fermies, since members of both
species can be any color.  Also, it makes for a much more visually
impressive comic - if all the inhabitants of the Land Beneath the
Ground were the same color as the background rock, they would be
entirely too well camouflaged for the pictures to show much of anything.
Besides, the native rock at those depths (probably eclogite) is, IMHO,
quite ugly (a very dark green) in comparison with the way the Terries
and Fermies are conventionally colored.  When the Terries and Fermies
appear on the surface at the entrance to the mine shaft, HD&L refer
to them as "funny-looking rocks" (if memory serves), so it is proper
for them to be variously colored.  You would still mistake them for
rocks, since rocks can indeed have a wide variety of colors and hues.
In fact, geologists carry around with them out in the field a thick
reference containing samples of all the very many distinct shades
for which official designations are recognized by the U.S. Geological
Survey (sort of like a book of samples for a paint salesman), so that
they can describe the colors of the rocks they find in a standard and
wide-ranging coloring system which will mean the same thing to all other
geologists (refering to their own copies of the manual, which they have
on their person at all times, good Junior Woodchucks that they are).

Wilmer Rivers
rivers at seismo.css.gov   (Internet gateway to the Terries and Fermies!)