204 NOTES — ORIGINAL AND SELECTED. 



Hairless Specimens of the Brown Rat at Leyton. — 



Mr. G. A. Doubleday writes as follows to tlie Zoologist : — 



" At the scientific meeting of the Zoological Society of 

 London at Hanover Square^ on December ist, Mr. F. E. 

 Beddard exhibited, on my behalf, a hairless specimen of the 

 Common Rat {Mus decumanus) which had been captured at 

 Leyton, Essex. Two other exactly similar individuals had been 

 caught, and others, in the same condition of nakedness, had 

 been observed at the same place. The skin was of a slate 

 colour, and wrinkled into folds all over the body. No cause was 

 assigned for the peculiar condition of the animal, some of the 

 members present ^being of opinion that it was congenital, and 

 others that it was pathological." 



[The late Dr. Bree recorded in the Field (Oct. 5th, 1872, p. 328) 

 the capture of two hairless rats at Thorpe-le-Soken, Essex. The 

 specimens were sent to the museum of the Royal College of 

 Surgeons.] . 



The Diffusion of Arctic Mammalia. — The following 

 paragraph appears in the Times of December igth, 1903 : — 



" Polar Bears Adrift on an Iceberg. — The Cunard steamer Campania, from 

 New York, which arrived at Queenstown yesterday afternoon, brings intelligence 

 that during the last outward passage of tlie Transatlantic liner Hanover, for 

 Baltimore, and when the steamer was in latitude 44 54 N., longitude 48 29 W., 

 ■crossing the banks of Newfoundland, a very large iceberg was sighted, the 

 contour lines of which, as seen from the liner, were high, but very irregular. The 

 passengers all gathered on the starboard side of the vessel, to view the iceberg, 

 and telescopes were brought into requisition to get a better view of it. Members 

 of the crew of the Hanover were the first to discovei that 011 the huge berg 

 several Polar bears were walking about, but, as the liner got more abreast of 

 the iceberg, all on board saw with the naked eye six bears moving restlessly upon 

 it. How the animals got there and their probable fate was the sole topic 

 of conversation among the passengers during that day. Captain Jacobs, of the 

 Hanover, stated that the berg was drifting in a S.S.E. direction." 



Most students of geology might allow the agency of icebergs, 

 as a means of the southward diffusion of Arctic mammalia, as a 

 barely possible influence. Few would regard it as of any 

 practical importance. Yet here we have an authentic account of 

 the discovery of six living Polar bears on an iceberg in a 

 latitude which is not that of Essex but of southern France. — 

 T. V. H. 



