Page:The Zoologist, 3rd series, vol 1 (1877).djvu/251

Rh also at Carrickglass, County Longford, and Burton Hall Woods, County Carlow. As regards the County of Dublin, Squirrels are said to have crossed over from the County Wicklow some ten or fifteen years ago. Concerning all these animals, it would be very desirable to have further particulars, and we trust Mr. Mahony, at his leisure, will if possible supply them. So little comparatively has been published on the native mammals of Ireland, that any information respecting their existence, distribution, and scarcity, or otherwise, in the sister isle will be welcome.—]

—At a meeting of the Glasgow Natural History Society, held on the 27th March last, Mr. James Lumsden, F.Z.S., read a paper "On the Mammals of the Neighbourhood of Lochlomond." He said that in the country which borders on Lochlomond there has been found a large proportion of the land mammals of Britain, but as in other districts several species which were at one time common are now rarely if ever met with, the advance of agriculture and the greater attention paid to the preservation of game having been most destructive to many of our wild animals, as well as to our rapacious birds. Within late years a great change has taken place in the mammalian fauna of this district. At one time wild cats were well known, and martens, if not often seen, betrayed their presence by their thieving habits; polecats were not uncommon; rats (excepting a few of the harmless Mus rattus), rabbits, and squirrels were unknown; and mountain hares were seldom met with. How changed it is now! The wild cat, marten and polecat extinct, and the brown rat swarming in and around all farm-steadings, rabbits plentiful on hill and low country alike, and the mountain hare numerous on all the higher ranges. Squirrels are also common in all the plantations, and are extending their distribution. The nature of the ground around Lochlomond renders the district peculiarly suited for all kinds of mammals. In the agricultural land at the southern end of the Loch are found moles, shrews, mice and voles, while the more rugged ground at the northern end gives shelter to the wild animals and mountain hares. So far as is known no complete list of the mammals found throughout the Lochlomond district has ever been drawn up, although the subject has not been neglected by naturalists and others. Mr. Lumsden then submitted a list of twenty-six species found in the district, and stated that in the notes accompanying it he had not attempted to describe the habits of any of these, as this had already been ably done by others, but had only endeavoured to record the present as compared with the past state of the mammalian fauna in the particular neighbourhood which he had explored.

—A very pretty variety of the mole was brought in to be stuffed on the 17th February. Its fur was exactly the colour of orange-peel; it had a reddish stripe down the belly and a few black stripes across the back. Unfortunately it was not sent till too far gone to