3 



Whereas no less than nineteen Mammals are on the Scottish 

 list, whose presence is not yet authenticated in the sister isle : — * 



From the above Tables it is clear that the principal distinctions 

 between the Mammal-faunas of England and Scotland are to be 

 found in the aerial order of Chiroptera and among the marine 

 Fissipedes and Cetaceans, while that of Ireland differs in the 

 absence of no less than twelve species of land animals. My friend 

 Professor A. Leith Adams has recently shownt that both the 

 recent and the extinct Hibernian Mammals agree with those of 

 Scotland rather than of England, and has given strong reasons for 

 believing that Ireland received this part of its fauna from the 

 south of Scotland, after its separation from Wales and western 

 England. It therefore becomes a point of some interest to com- 

 pare the fauna of the Scottish Islands with those of the mainland 

 and of Ireland. In such an investigation it is most convenient to 

 restrict our attention to the indigenous terrestrial Mammals, dis- 

 missing entirely the Bats, Seals, and Cetaceans, and also the intro- 

 duced and cosmopolitan Rats and House-Mouse, which may almost 

 be regarded as domestic animals. Taking the Scottish Islands in 

 four principal groups — (I.) the Inner Islands (Skye, Mull, Islay, 

 &c.)j (II.) the Outer Hebrides (the Lews, Harris, the Uists, Ben- 

 becula, &c); (HI.) Orkney; and (IV.) Shetland — we find the 

 distribution of Mammals, as far as I have been able to ascertain 

 the facts, to be as shown in the following Table, which represents 

 the known range of twenty-four species of land quadrupeds: — 



* On the somewhat vexed subject of Irish Mammals I have followed the list given by Pro- 

 fessor Leith Adams, on the authority of Mr. A. G. More. Proe. R. Dublin Society, 1878, 

 pp. 40, 41, The complete absence from Ireland of some species, as the Common Shrew 

 Weasel, Harvest Mouse, &c, has been disputed by some writers. 



t Proc. R. Irish Academy, 2nd Ser., in., pp. 99-100; Proc. R. Dublin Soc, 1878, p. 42, 



