NATURAL HISTORY SOCIETY OF GLASGOW. 139 



Scotland at a much later date than is usually believed.* 

 According to tradition they were once so numerous that the 

 natives of the west coast buried their dead on the island of Handa 

 to avoid the ghoul-like ravages of the Wolves (Voyage Eound 

 Scotl., p. 347), and as we have already mentioned, Sir R Gordon 

 speaks of them as still existing in 1630. Mr Scrope collected 

 traditional accounts of four old Wolves and several whelps, which 

 were all killed about the same time, but at different places, 

 between the year 1G90 and 1700. The localities named are at 

 Achumore, Assynt, Halladale, and Glen-Loth, the last-mentioned 

 individual having been the veritable " last Wolf " of the county. 

 The story goes that a man named Poison and his son discovered 

 the den and were destroying the cubs, when the dam returned 

 and came to the rescue, but after a desperate struggle, in the 

 description of which there appear to be some touches of the 

 mythical, they dispatched her with their dirks. "These," con- 

 cludes Mr Scrope, "were the last Wolves killed in Sutherlandshire, 

 and the den was between Craig -Ehadich and Craig- Voakie, by the 

 narrow Glen of Loth." (Days of Deer-Stalking, pp. 374-7). 



The Eeptiles of Sutherlandshire are more numerous than might 

 have been expected, almost all the well-ascertained Scotch species 

 having been observed in the county. 



PAET I.— MAMMALS. 

 COMMON BAT. 



VESPERUGO PIPISTRELLUS {Geoffroy). 



Although abundant in many parts of the Highlands, this is far 

 from being a common species in Sutherlandshire. In the west of 

 the county, a careful observer assured us that he had seen only 



* We may observe that there is little doubt that the story of the " last Wolf 

 in Scotland '' having been killed in 1680 by Locheil is an error which originated 

 in a mistake of Pennant's; Locheil's Wolf was the last in Lochaber, but the 

 brutes lingered much later in other districts. The Brothers Stuart, in their 

 "Lays of the Deer-forest," have collected many GaeKc traditions on the 

 subject, and have shown that probably the real "last Wolf" was one killed so 

 late as about the year 1743, by M'Queen of Pall-a-chrocain, between that place 

 and Fi-Ginthas, in Strathdearn. M'Qaeen lived till 1796, so that the tradition 

 has not passed through many hands. 



