154 The Scott is J i Naturalist. 



recognised, and the need of it felt, is proved by the very cordial 

 and hearty response to the invitation by the societies. May we 

 not hope to see similar federations for similar objects in' the rest 

 of Scotland at no distant date, followed by community of aims 

 and concerted efforts by these federations. From such efforts we 

 might reasonably hope to witness a rapid advance no less in the 

 real achievements than in the popular interest in, and true appre- 

 ciation of, the natural sciences in our midst. 



THE PERTHSHIRE NATURAL HISTORY MUSEUM. 

 By F. BUCHANAN WHITE, M.D., F.L.S. 



( Continued from page 104. ) 



IN the first part of this paper I have described what has been 

 done in the " Index " or " Type " department of the 

 Museum. It now remains to give a brief notice of the chief or 

 Perthshire department. The specimens in this are intended to 

 illustrate, in as complete a manner as possible, the natural history 

 of Perthshire, and every specimen in it has been obtained in the 

 district. It was indeed at one time suggested that species of great 

 rarity, and of which local specimens could not be readily obtained, 

 should be represented by examples of exotic origin till such time 

 as they could be replaced by Perthshire ones ; but as these would 

 not be vouchers of the occurrence in the district of these species, 

 and as errors might thus easily arise, it was decided that none but 

 Perthshire examples should be admitted. As a matter of fact, 

 though we use the word " Perthshire," the district whose natural 

 history is embraced by the museum includes a little more than 

 the county of Perth. A large extent of the boundaries of the 

 shire are natural ones, but in other parts they are entirely artificial. 

 Especially is this the case on the eastern side, where an imaginary 

 line cuts off from Perthshire a few miles of the Tay, which river is 

 otherwise altogether in the county. At this point we have there- 

 fore ignored the artificial boundary, and adopted a more natural 

 one by including in the district the whole of the Tay. The area 

 embraced is consequently more correctly termed " Perthshire and 

 the Basin of the Tay." 



To illustrate the distribution of species, the area has been 

 divided into a number of sub-districts, defined by the geological 

 formation and the watersheds. The geological formation alone 

 divides the county into two great sections — the Devonian and the 

 Silurian — which, moreover, correspond with the physical features, 

 the Devonian being the lowland, and the Silurian the highland, 

 portion of the county. These two districts are subdivided into 



