The Mammalian Fauna of the Edinburgh District. 109 
exist at all, it is his razson d’étre.” At the present time there 
are ten packs of fox-hounds in Scotland, all located south of 
the Firths of Tay and Clyde. Six of them hunt the eastern 
division, namely—the Fife hounds, 50 couples (kennels at 
Harleswynd, Ceres); the Linlithgow and Stirlingshire, 35 
couples (Golf Hall, Corstorphine); the Berwickshire, 35 
couples (Belchester, Coldstream) ; the Duke of Buccleuch’s, 57 
couples (St Boswell’s, Roxburghshire) ; Mr Scott-Plummer’s, 
20 couples (Sunderland Hall, Selkirk); and the Jedforest 
(Lintalee, Jedburgh). During the season 1890-91 the Lin- 
lithgow and Stirlingshire pack killed 244 brace of foxes, as I 
am informed by Mr E. Cotesworth, the huntsman, who 
adds that the yearly average is about 25 brace. Mr W. 
Shore, the huntsman of the Duke of Buccleuch’s pack, tells 
me that they usually kill about 30 brace in a season. From 
these statements I estimate that the six packs kill over 
250 foxes per annum. Of course, a good many more are 
quietly got rid of in less demonstrative ways, even in the 
heart of the hunting areas; and in the hilly districts the 
keepers and shepherds openly capture or destroy all they 
can. Live cubs are readily disposed of at from 10s. to 15s, 
a-piece, to be turned out in hunting districts, chiefly in 
England. In the spring of 1889 a litter of five was dug out 
-of an earth on the Pentlands above Dreghorn. A vixen and 
her six cubs, taken on the Peeblesshire hills in the end of 
April last, were sold at 10s. a-piece, while another vixen 
and five cubs, captured on the Pentlands above Boghall on 
11th May, were disposed of at £3, 10s., being £1 for the 
mother and 10s. for each of her young ones. 
Though, as has just been shown, this animal is by no means 
rare with us, it is comparatively seldom that a person not 
having special facilities has the opportunity of writing “ Fox 
seen” in his diary. Still, in the course of the last fifteen 
years, 1 have observed them on many occasions (and smelt 
them on many more!) during my natural history rambles in 
Midlothian and the adjoining counties. Quite recently I had 
an excellent view of one on the Pentlands as it left the rocks 
above Swanston and trotted leisurely over the summit of 
Cairketton hill When my father tenanted the farm of 
