316 HISTORY OF THE EUROPEAN FAUNA. 



occupies to some extent the former haunts of the 

 Alpine Hare (cf. Fig. 8, p. 137). Might not the 

 European Hare, as suggested, possess some advan- 

 tages which enabled it to drive the other into more 

 inaccessible parts, thus producing the peculiarity 

 of range? The present distribution of the Alpine 

 and the European Hare (L. Europceus) appears to me 

 to strongly support such an assumption. It is not 

 the cold which has driven the Alpine Hare to the 

 Alps; and its presence there is not, as is often sup- 

 posed, a "standing testimony of a former arctic 

 climate" in Europe, but merely the necessary con- 

 sequence of the weaker species being thrust into 

 less accessible regions by a stronger rival. 



Muscardinus avellanarhis, the common Dormouse, 

 though by no means confined to the Alps, has prob- 

 ably originated there. It is found up to a height 

 of nearly 5000 feet in these mountains, and is spread 

 over Europe at nearly equal distances from the Alps 

 in all directions. Being absent from Ireland, Scot- 

 land, Norway, and Northern Russia, it seems as 

 if it had only diffused northward in more recent 

 times. 



The closely allied genus Myoxus is likewise of 

 European extraction, some species being known from 

 French eocene deposits. 



There are only a few typically Alpine Birds. One of 

 these is the Alpine Accentor (Accentor collaris], which 

 on rare occasions visits England, and Northern 

 Europe generally. It is, however, by no means 



