MAN AND NATURE 3 



which the Neolithic invaders of Scotland had at their disposal, 

 a great step would be made towards gaining a basis from 

 which to compute the influence of man upon the animal 

 life. 



In the third place, from its small size Scotland gains 

 advantages in such a study ; and this partly because the 

 fauna of a small country is more compact, and its changes, 

 as a rule, are more readily marked ; and partly because 

 Scotland's few degrees of latitude eliminate the possibility 

 of temperature barriers, one of the most important and far- 

 reaching of the climatic influences which complicate the 

 fluctuations of animal life in continental areas. 



And lastly, since the study of Nature gained a firm 

 foothold, Scotland has possessed a succession of observers 

 and recorders , such as few countries of similar size and 

 population can claim, naturalists whose labours form a solid 

 foundation for the accurate estimation of the later changes 

 in animal life.' 



METHODS OF ENQUIRY 



To enquire into the doings of man is to investigate 

 History, and the historical method enters largely into this 

 natural history study. The foundation of our enquiry must 

 be such records as the past has left us. The chronicled 

 history of Scotland begins with the advent of the Romans 

 on their northward progress through these islands in the 

 first century of our era, but since, at that time and for many 

 centuries thereafter, the records of even the great political 

 events, of the doings of man with man, are vague and 

 unsatisfactory, it need hardly be said that the dealings of 

 man with animals seldom encumber the written page. 



Even in the " historic period " therefore, the beaten 

 tracks of historical knowledge have to be forsaken, and 

 appeal has to be made to the relics man has left in his long- 

 forsaken homes, to the casual pictures he has carved, often 

 with hand and eye of wonderful skill, to the tales of travellers, 

 many from foreign lands, who described the features of 

 Scottish animal life which struck their fancy as differing from 

 those familiar to them, and to the records of unusually 

 outstanding natural phenomena which, on occasion, our 



