72 EXTINCT BRITISH ANIMALS. 
ciated with man in Caithness is of especial interest, 
as tending to confirm the truth of the tradition that 
the jarls of Orkney in the twelfth century were in 
the habit of crossing the Pentland Firth for the 
purpose of hunting the Red-deer and the Reindeer 
in the wilds of Caithness. 
Torfzeus, in his history of Orkney (“ Orcades, seu 
Rerum Orcadensium Historia,” Lib. I. cap. xxxvi.), 
written at the close of the seventeenth century, 
thus translates a passage from the “ Orkneyinga 
Saga :” “Consueverant Comites in Catenesiam, mdeque 
ad montana ad venatum caprearum rangiferorumque 
quotannis profiscist.” Dr. Fleming, in his “ History 
of British Animals,’ published in Edinburgh in 
1828, quoting this passage, remarks that “it would 
lead to the belief that Reindeer once dwelt in 
the mountains of Caithness, were it not extremely 
probable that Red-deer were intended.” Dr. 
Hibbert also, who has written an elaborate critique 
upon the subject,* was at first inclined to think 
that Torfzeus had inade a mistake here, and that 
he should have stated “the Roe-deer and the 
Red-deer,” instead of “the Roe and the Reindeer.” 
But a learned Icelander, Jonas Jonzeus, who in 
1780 published an abstract and Latin translation 
of the Saga,t has explained the manuscript sources 
* «On the Question of the Existence of the Reindeer during the 
Twelfth Century in Caithness,’ in Brewster’s Zdinb. Journ. of Science, 
New Series, vol. v. p. 50. 
+ “ Orkneyinga Saga sive Historia Orcadensium: Saga hins Helga 
Magnusa Eyia Jarls, sive Vita Sancti Magni Insularum Comitis 
Islandice et Latine,” edidit J. Jonzeus, 4to, Hafniz, 1780, p. 384. 
