12 INTRODUCTORY 



As the sole object of this memoir is to furnish information 

 concerning the mammals now or recently to be found in 

 the district, I have deemed it expedient to include in the 

 catalogue only those species which are known to have 

 occurred within the present century. Disregarding such as 

 had disappeared before Sibbald's day, and also the Narwhal 

 (Monodon monoceros), of which an example, obtained near 

 the Isle of May in June 1648, is mentioned by Tulpius 

 (" Obs. Med.," p. 376), I thus exclude but one species having 

 anything like a substantial claim to a place in the list, namely, 

 the Sperm Whale or Cachelot (Physeter macrocephalus), 

 of which three are recorded as having been stranded in the 

 Forth, namely, one at Limekilns in 1689, and two near 

 Cramond, in 1701 and 1769 respectively. The fact that 

 when the Athole herd of the so-called Wild White Cattle was 

 broken up in 1834, about a dozen of them were secured by 

 the then Duke of Buccleuch, and kept for a few years in the 

 park at Dalkeith, does not entitle the animal to a place 

 in this list, even when taken in connection with Bishop 

 Leslie's statement that it existed at Stirling (in the royal 

 park ?) in 1578. Those who desire information regarding the 

 extinct forms may be referred to Owen's "British Fossil 

 Mammals and Birds," Dr J. A. Smith's papers in the 

 " Proceedings " of the Society of Antiquaries of Scotland 

 (vols. viii., ix., etc.), Woodward & Sherborn's " Catalogue of 



Kimmerghame (Berwickshire), Lin ton Moss (Roxburghshire), and Loch Marlce 

 (Perthshire); of the Elk at Whitrig Bog (Berwickshire), near Hawick, and 

 near Selkirk ; apparently also at Duddingstou and near Cramond (Mid- 

 lothian), near North Berwick (East Lothian), Kirkurd (Peeblesshire), Marlee 

 (Perthshire), etc.; of the Reindeer near Craigton (Linlithgowshire), and on 

 the Pentland Hills above Dreghorn ; of the Great Long-horned Ox or Urus at 

 Whitrig Bog and Swinton Mill (Berwickshire), near Jedburgh, Lilliesleaf, 

 and Linton Moss (Roxburghshire), Whitrauirhall near Selkirk, Newburgh 

 (Fife), etc. ; and of the Mammoth at Clifton Hall on the confines of the 

 counties of Edinburgh and Linlithgow (Mem. Wern. Soc., iv., 58), and 

 at Kimmerghame ( Berwickshire). 



