ON THE MAMMALIA. Vll 



As already remarked, few ^Cetaceans have been recorded from the 

 coasts of South-western Scotland, most of the species which have 

 been taken on our shores having occurred on the north and east 

 coasts. In 1866 a Rorqual was cast ashore on the island of Islay; 

 part of its skeleton is preserved in the Museum of the University of 

 Cambridge, and it was referred by MM. Gervais and Van Beneden 

 to the rare species Balcenoptera laticeps^ but I believe that Professor 

 Flower considers it to have been the common Lesser Rorqual (B. ros- 

 trata). In May, 1829, a Sperm Whale (Physeter macrocephalus] was 

 killed near Oban, and its jaw-bones are still preserved at Dunstaff- 

 nage Castle, as recorded by Professor Turner. 2 A common Beaked 

 Whale (Hyperoodon rostratus) was taken in the Gareloch in 1863, 

 and was identified by Dr. Scoular. 3 The Porpoise, which constantly 

 enters the Firth in pursuit of herrings, and which is said to have 

 come up as far as Glasgow in old days when the Clyde was still pure, 

 ends our brief list of four out of the twenty-one species of Cetaceans 

 which have been recorded in British waters. 



Of the Ungulates, or hoofed animals, the Red Deer has long ago 

 been exterminated in the Lowlands, but it is sedulously protected in 

 the Highlands ; it is sometimes seen on the Loch Lomond hills, and 

 is abundant in Arran, where a judicious admixture of fresh blood 

 has renewed the vigour of the native breed, once nearly extinct. 

 The Roe Deer, on the other hand, has become more numerous of late 

 years in many parts of the Lowlands, owing doubtless to better pro- 

 tection, and to the increase of woods ; an albino roe, killed some years 

 ago near Loch Lomond, is preserved in the collection of the late Sir 

 James Colquhoun, Bart., of Luss. At Cadzow, the original seat of 

 the Dukes of Hamilton, still exists one of the few remaining herds 

 of wild white cattle. These are believed by some zoologists to be 

 the direct descendants of the mighty Bos primigenius, while others 

 consider them to have been derived from domestic animals which had 

 resumed a feral life, and reverted to some extent to the characters of 

 their remote ancestors. Be this as it may there can be no doubt as 

 to the great antiquity and interest of the breed, though little authentic 

 can now be ascertained as to its early history. Such cattle were 

 formerly kept at Cumbernauld, near Glasgow, Drumlanrig in Dum- 

 friesshire, and other parks in Scotland and the north of England ; 

 but they now exist only at Cadzow, at Chillingham in Northumber- 

 land, Syme Park in Cheshire, and Chartley in Staffordshire. 



All the British species of Rodents occur in the west of Scotland 

 excepting the Dormouse and the little Harvest Mouse ; the former of 

 these does not appear to cross the Tweed, and I have never met with 

 the latter in the west, although it is sparingly distributed throughout 



1 Osteographie des Cetacds, i. p. 200. 2 Proc. Roy. Soc. Edinb. 1871, pp. 365-366. 



3 Proc. Nat. Hist. Soc. Glasg. i. p. 82. 



