THE ZOOLOGIST. 
THIRD SERIES. 
Wont.) Ale Eve Lis. deegaae [No. 4. 
ANCIENT AND EXTINCT BRITISH QUADRUPEDS.« 
By A. Letra Apams, M.D., F.R.S. 
Any account of the quadrupeds which frequented the British 
Islands in bygone ages and before historic times would be im- 
perfect without a brief allusion to the physical conditions of the 
country during the period of their existence. My observations on 
that head, however, will be confined to the vast epoch which has 
elapsed since the close of what is known as the glacial period, when 
Europe was emerging from the white sheet which for unreckoned 
ages had clad it, from the Pole to the Mediterranean, in ice and 
snow. The proofs of this curious episode in the history of the earth 
are as clear as is the existence of glaciers at the present day. It is, 
moreover, evident, that the cold period came on suddenly, and, as 
regards the British Islands, at a time when the physical aspect of 
the country—at least, as regards the main features of the land- 
scape—did not materially differ from what is now observed. The 
Jand was then inhabited by quadrupeds, some of which were 
identical with species now living, although many afterwards became 
extinct, and did not reappear. This has been named the pre-glacial 
period, when our climate was perhaps somewhat milder than it is at 
* This article on a subject of much interest to zoologists, and upon which com- 
paratively little has been written, was originally published in the Natural-History 
columns of ‘The Field,’ and appeared in chapters during the months of October, 
November and December, 1875, and January, 1876. It is now reprinted for the 
benefit of such of our readers as may not haye seen it, and for the convenience of 
those who, having already perused the scattered chapters as they first appeared, 
may be glad to see them now collected in the more convenient and portable form 
of an octavo.—Iip 
KR 
