Page:Early Man in Britain and His Place in the Tertiary Period.djvu/289

] by Dr. J. A. Smith to have been comparatively abundant in Scotland ; and the discovery of its bones in the refuse-heaps at Caithness leave no room for doubting that the animal was used for food by the inhabitants of the neighbouring burghs, or massive circular dwellings. It is comparatively abundant in the peat bogs and marls of Ireland.

The wild urus is not known in Ireland, the larger skulls of oxen, not referable to the Celtic short-horn, belonging to the large domestic breed, which was probably introduced by the Scandinavian invaders between A.D. 500 and 1000. Nor have any remains of beaver or common hare been discovered in any Irish deposit of Prehistoric age.

The second group of Prehistoric animals consists of the dog, horned sheep, goat, Celtic short-horned ox, and hog, introduced by Neolithic man, and which will be treated in discussing his position as a herdsman. The third group consists of the short-horned ox, the turf-hog, and the goat, which escaped from the servitude of man and reverted to a wild state in the virgin forest, as yet untouched by the axe of the woodman, in the same manner as they have become wild in North America and in Australia. Possibly the horse also may have reverted equally to a wild state, but it may have descended from the wild horses so abundant in Britain in the Pleistocene age.