182 



the cost of five shillings a head ? Mutton from Australia, beef iVorn 

 America, game from India, salmon from Labrador, all these are 

 within the range of possibility now-a-days at a London Tavern 

 dinner, priced as above, and it is to be hoped that the great supply 

 of food in all parts of the world, which as yet has been turned to 

 little use, may ere long find a common market in London, not so 

 much for the benefit of the rich as for the use of the poor man." 



If the exportation of game from India as here proposed were in 

 the least degree successful it would be one step towards a remedy 

 for the greatest want of our Indian sportsmen ; the institution of 

 game laws or, as that name is not a popular one, regulations for 

 the protection of certain beasts and birds during a close or breeding 

 season and for taxing guns, nets, &c. 



Page 21, No, 17, Lutra Auro Brunnea. 



Small Hill Otter. 

 Jerdon writes as follows of these otters : 



" Hodgson has described a small otter from the hills, as Lutra 

 auro brunnea. Size small ; habit of body vermiform ; tail less 

 than two-thirds of the length of the body ; toes and nails fully 

 developed ; fur longish and rough. Color, rich chestnut-brown 

 above, golden red below and on the extremities. Length, head and 

 body, 20 to 22 inches ; tail, 12 to 13. 



Blyth, in his catalogue, has No. 215, Lutra, very like L. uair, 

 but specimens with adult dentition smaller by one-half or nearly so. 

 Found only at great elevations in Ceylon. This is probably the 

 same as the small otter of the Neilgherries, referred to by some 

 writers in the Bengal Sporting Review y &c., by some called the 

 black otter, by others the red one ; and is perhaps the same as 

 Hodgson's L. auro brunnea." 



I hope that by this time a specimen of the Neilgherry hill otter 

 has been furnished to the-Madras Museum, or that some lover of 

 natural history will procure one for that institution : 



Since the first part of these notes was printed, I have found the 

 small hill otters of the Neilgherries in the beautiful stream running- 

 out of th<3 Ron/Jabs, p ag t the bungalow at the Avalanche. I saw 



