48 THE SCOTTISH NATURALIST 



until I received the following note from Mr Charles Stark, 

 a competent observer in Glen Trool : 



"On 2nd December [1918] I was looking at some rabbit snares 

 in Buchan, and, happening to look up, I saw what I thought was 

 a buzzard. I went on, when, to my surprise, a golden eagle 

 swooped down and took a rabbit from a snare about ten yards 

 from me, leaving only the head in the snare. This morning 

 [4th December] a similar occurrence took place, only this time 

 from a trap instead of a snare. The trap pin had got loose in the 

 ground, which was soaked with heavy rain, and the bird carried 

 off the trap with the rabbit. On the first occasion the eagle 

 took his prey to a precipice on Glenhead Farm, overlooking the 

 Gairland Burn ; but this morning he went off in the direction 

 of the Dungeon, so far as I could see in the blinding rain. 

 Shortly after coming here on 4th March last I saw an eagle 

 on two occasions. A shepherd on the farm of Palgown informed 

 me that a pair of eagles used to frequent that part of the Merrick 

 known as the Lum o' the Gutter, and always came and went 

 by Loch Doon." 



Shepherds and game preservers may view with scant 

 favour the return of these formidable birds of raven to 

 our Galloway Hills ; but for the artist and the field naturalist 

 a soaring eagle is the one feature necessary to make perfect 

 the savage grandeur of Glen Trool. 



Benyellary, the peak adjoining the Merrick and its 

 rival in height, bears in modern spelling the ancient Gaelic 

 name beinn iolaire the eagle's hill. It stands on the 

 border of the Forest of Buchan, treeless now, of yore the 

 hunting-ground of the Comyns, Earls of Buchan, wherein 

 survive several names commemorative of the chase, such 

 as Shalloch o' Minnoch, which gives the sound of the 

 Gaelic sealg, hunting-ground, and Mulwharker = maol adhairce 

 (pron. " aharky "), bare hill of the hunting-horn. 



Bank Voles in Clyde. As I have only seen the Bank 

 Vole recorded from four or five places in the Clyde faunal area, 

 it may be worth recording that I obtained several here in February 

 1919. James Bartholomew, Glenorchard, near Glasgow. 



