The Mammalian Fauna of the Edinburgh District. 103 
was recorded in the Magazine of Natural History (iii., p. 236) 
prior to the appearance of Scoular’s note. What Scoular 
(op. cit., 1834, vi, p. 512) really did was to recognise the 
variety remifer for the first time as Scottish. 
Since this paper was read, I have had an unusually 
good opportunity of studying the habits of this interesting 
animal in the Braid burn below Comiston farm. About 8 P.M., 
on 22nd May, while strolling quietly by the side of the stream, 
a series of ripples spreading over the water from the bank 
almost beneath my feet attracted my attention. In a few 
seconds the wavelets had vanished, and the surface of the 
pool was as still as before; but while I gazed into it a little 
creature, clothed as it were in silver, darted from the bank to 
the bottom of the stream, and after hastily snatching some 
water insects or crustaceans from a piece of wood lying on 
the mud, returned precipitately to its den. In this way it 
continued to feed for some minutes, when the sudden appear- 
ance of three others swimming out from the opposite bank 
was evidently the signal for play, for in an instant the four 
joined company and scampered up the stream after each 
other with astonishing rapidity, swimming on the surface or 
beneath it, or running on the margin with equal facility. 
Having gone a distance of twenty-five or thirty yards, they 
disappeared into a drain, but soon reappeared, and pro- 
ceeded down stream, in the same manner as they had gone 
up, till about twenty yards below where I stood, when they 
disappeared a second time. In a few minutes they were 
out again, and so the chase went on for fully half an hour. 
They frequently made a squeaking noise, which seemed to 
me identical with that uttered by the Common Shrew. With 
one exception they were quite pale on the under parts. One 
of them now forms part of the collection of native mammals 
in the Museum of Science and Art; and the gambols of the 
survivors have been a source of pleasure to me on several 
subsequent occasions. 
TALPA EUROPA JL. Mote. 
Innumerable colonies of Moles inhabit all our cultivated 
lands and pastures, from the shores of the Forth to the 
