42 CAKNIVOKA 



hounds pay the Tweed or the Esk a visit, which they have 

 done quite recently. Mr Chouler, keeper, Dalkeith Park, has 

 the head of the last otter killed by Mr Hill ; it was taken in 

 the Esk on 10 th October 1881. 



' BADGER. 



Meles taxus {Schreh). 



That the Badger, or Brock, as it was called, was a common 

 animal throughout the district in olden- times goes without 

 saying. At the time the " Old Statistical Account " was 

 drawn up — the closing years of last century — it was still well 

 known as an inhabitant of many localities, though even then 

 its numbers were greatly reduced ; and the adverse conditions 

 continuing to grow, its extermination in most of its former 

 haunts was apparently accomplished by about the middle of 

 the present century. Here and there a miserable remnant 

 lingered a few years longer, but it is very doubtful if more 

 than eight or nine pairs of the original stock now exist 

 anywhere in the valley of the Forth, and these mainly in its 

 remotest parts among the Perthshire hills, concerning which 

 the Eev. P. Graham wrote in his " Sketches of Perthshire " 

 (2nd ed., 1812, p. 216), "We have hares, badgers, weasels, 

 etc., everywhere." In the valley of the Tweed it maintained 

 its footing better, and a few favourite habitats are known to 

 be still occupied. 



In the " Old Statistical Account " of Duddingston (vol. 

 xviii., p. 374) we read that " a solitary badger at times may 

 provoke a stubborn chace and contest," and it is interesting 

 to know that at the present moment a few are to be found 

 within a very short distance of that locality, though I fear 

 we cannot claim them as the descendants of the sturdy beasts 



