The Vertebeatp:s of Solway. 17 



leaving the land to reside in towns merely because employment, 

 and therefore food, are more easily obtained there. In this 

 respect man is almost on the same level as the beasts of the field 

 and the fowls of the air. 



By the term " vertebrates " it is, perhaps, quite unnecessary 

 to explain that the back-boned animals are meant. These, of 

 course, comprise the mammalia, the birds, the reptiles, and the 

 lishes. '' Solway " is one of the faunal districts into which the 

 late Dr Buchanan White divided Scotland. These divisions are 

 in all cases based on the watershed (so far as the mainland is con- 

 cerned), and in practice are very convenient, and they are accepted 

 and used by all working Scottish zoologists. I have said that Dr 

 Buchanan White, in arranging these faunal areas, •' divided 

 Scotland," but, as a matter of fact, he was compelled by watershed 

 considerations as he went along the Borders to appropriate rather 

 considerable slices from Cumberland and Northumberland. In 

 doing so, Dr Buchanan White shewed conclusively that nature 

 had not erred. The mistake of supposing that Cumberland and 

 Xorthumberland lay altogether in England has arisen simply 

 through political exigencies. It will serve our present purpose 

 best to consider " Solway " roughly as all the country that lies 

 betwixt the Esk and Lochryan. The large bit of Cumberland and 

 the little bit of Ayrshire that properly belong to " Solway " may 

 lit this time be left out of consideration in discussing our subject. 



MAMMALIA. 

 The AVild Cat (/>eh's cuius, Linn.). 



This fine creature has long been extinct here. In Dumfries- 

 shire few of them survived when the century began. The last 

 record I can find for the county is that of a wild cat shot on the 

 heights of Middlebie, betwixt AVastwater and Cruive, in January. 

 1813. It must have been an extraordinary large-sized animal, for 

 it is said to have measured 3 feet 9 inches in total length. In the 

 Stewartry wild cats lived only a little longer, one having been 

 killed by a Mr Beck, then farmer in Balmangan, about 1820. Mr 

 John M'Kie, of Anchorlee, Kirkcudbright, told me in a letter 

 written in September, 1880, " that it was related to him when a 

 boy by a native of Borgue, named James M'Taggart, that he saw 

 two foxhounds belonging to Alexander, the county huntsman, so 

 t)rn by one or more wild cats near the cliffs at Senwick glebe 



