228 THE ZOOLOGIST. 
the present, a chapter is devoted to the history of the so-called 
Wild White Cattle which once roamed our ancient forests in 
company with the Wolf and the Boar, and whose descendants 
in a few scattered herds, scrupulously protected, are still to be 
seen in about half a dozen English and Scottish parks. 
In most works treating of British animals some brief 
allusions to the former existence of the above-named species 
may be discovered, but the subject is usually dismissed in a 
very few lines, and in nearly every case with an erroneous 
indication of the date at which the animal became extinct in 
Britain. Thus, in the case of the Bear, almost every writer who 
has had occasion to refer to this animal has copied Pennant’s 
statement to the effect that the last Bear was killed in Scotland 
in 1057 by a Gordon, who, in reward for his valour, was directed 
by the king to carry three Bears’ heads on his banner. But, as 
pointed out in the work before us, this is altogether a fallacy. 
Reference to a copy of the original Latin MS., from which the 
translation quoted by Pennant was made (preserved in the 
Advocates’ Library, Edinburgh), shows that, on the occasion 
referred to, the animal killed was a Boar, ‘‘immanem aprum,” 
while the arms of the Gordon are Boars’, not Bears’, heads. 
Numerous as are the Ursine remains which have been dis- 
covered at different times in various parts of the United Kingdom, 
there seems to be no reason for supposing that there were any 
Bears in this country at the date of the Conquest. Mr. Harting 
criticises the well-known quotations from Martial and Plutarch, 
relative to the transportation of Caledonian Bears to Rome, 
and calls attention to the fact of their being ‘direct testi- 
mony that the Bear was killed by the hand of man during 
the Roman occupation of Britain,’ although we observe that, in 
a recent notice of this work in ‘The Saturday Review,’ he is 
accused of having overlooked this important piece of evidence. 
‘He states nevertheless (pp. 12, 13), that in the collection of bones 
from the ‘‘ refuse heaps’? round Colchester, made by Dr. Bree, 
the remains of this animal were found along with those of the 
Badger, Wolf, Celtic Shorthorn, and Goat, and he adds that 
Professor Boyd Dawkins has also met with it in a similar “‘ refuse 
heap” at Richmond, in Yorkshire, which is most probably of 
Roman origin. He adduces presumptive evidence, moreover, of 
the existence of Bears in Britain during the eighth and ninth 
