Usually when people attempt to become 'anonymous' it is by behavioral stratagems. However, in periods of great stress they may unwittingly turn to rudimentary remnants of phylogenetically older defenses, forms of biological camouflage. This defensive camouflage reaction is one form of what Meerloo terms 'the passive surrender to danger', a defense on the biological level analogous to the ego defense of 'identification with the aggressor'. It serves the threefold purpose of warning, communication of mood, and camouflage. Meerloo calls particular attention to the contagious character of these archaic signals, which is evidence of their functions of warning and communication. He uses biological analogies to show how we may remark the purposive significance of such primitive psychosomatic phenomena as syncope, fear melanosis, and various other disorders of the skin. He regards this paper as largely analogical and speculative, but intends it to be a stimulus to further comparative study of bodily communication.