NOTES AND QUERIES. 67 
The relation of the soaring birds to artificial air-navigation 
fills the whole subject with a sort of pathos. A Turkey-buzzard, 
most despised of all the birds, employs mechanical activities by 
using a device of such simplicity that, compared to it, a common 
grindstone is a complex machine, for the purposes of air- 
locomotion in the search for carrion, with conspicuous and 
complete success, itself being a working model of the very thing 
which man has worked, and sweated, and died to possess, and he 
has never seen it! For a period of time coéval with his own 
existence on this planet this thing has been going on, and the 
world is full of it now; and still the mature conviction of both 
common-sense and Science is—that it is impossible. 
NOTES AND QUERIES. 
MAMMALIA. 
Variation of Colour in the Squirrel.—As the habits and colouring of 
the Squirrel have been discussed a good deal lately, I take the opportunity 
to mention a few observations I have made. I think Mr. Aplin is right in 
saying that in some cases the white or light tail is only an individual 
peculiarity, for on two occasions I have come across nests of young 
Squirrels, all of which had the tail light-coloured ; while one of the parents, 
in each case, was of the ordinary colour, with a red tail. In Savernake 
Forest, Wilts, the light-tailed Squirrels seemed to inhabit a regular district, 
and in this part of the forest I think I hardly ever saw one without a light 
tail, though they were apparently of all ages. I supposed this to be due in 
some way to their food. I may mention that the young light-tailed 
Squirrels had not got light-coloured ears.— A. H. MacpyeErson (51, 
Gloucester Place, Hyde Park). 
Otters near Salisbury. — As there is much interest taken in our few 
remaining wild animals, the notes I have by me concerning the frequent 
occurrence of the Otter in this neighbourhood during the last two years 
may be of interest to the readers of ‘The Zoologist.’ I can enumerate 
more than a score of instances happening since the autumn of 1884, 
and additional proofs, if any were wanted, that the autumn is the usual 
time for them to drop their young, though perhaps they vary in this respect 
more than any other animal. On October 8th, 1884, I heard that 
one of our men, in cutting the sedge by the river-side, had come across 
three little Otters, newly boru, which he had killed and thrown down 
