17 10 Proceedings of the Royal Irish Academy. 



the other member of our present fauna which had representatives in the 

 Pleistocene e.g., the Irish Hare. This Hare and the Irish Stoat (which is not 

 proved to have been of pleistocene age, though it probably is so) are our 

 sole peculiar mammals, and these two of all pleistocene species are the most 

 likely to have survived the Glacial Epoch, and undoubtedly appear to be the 

 oldest members of our fauna. Of the two, the Irish Stoat is absolutely 

 peculiar, and represents a stock of long-standing existence in the country. The 

 Hare, while also peculiar, is closely allied to the extinct pleistocene hare of 

 south England, Hi n ton's Hare (Lepus anglicas), rather than to the true 

 L. timid 'us of Norway, or its Scottish representative, L. timid us scoticus. 



The Irish Stoat is the most mysterious of all our mammals, because, 

 although it is a peculiar species, and therefore necessarily of considerable age 

 in Ireland (as stated above), a stoat has not been definitely proved to be a 

 member of the Irish pleistocene fauna. Eemembering that stoats are very 

 plastic animals, it may be well not to particularize too much about its 

 history, and to be content to regard it as with the Hare one of our oldest 

 Mammals. 



The close resemblance between the Irish Hare and Hinton's Hare suggests 

 a recent connexion between Ireland and England ; and it is along this 

 connexion that our post-Glacial mammals may be supposed to have reached 

 the country. All these (except the stoat) are identical with the coiTesponding 

 forms found in England, and therefore date from the same period as the English 

 forms, and came to us from England. They must have come to us veiy 

 recently, or they would have had time to have become distinct ; and the re- 

 stricted distribution of some of them, such as Xatterer's, Daubenton's, and the 

 TThiskered Bats (which may, however, have arrived since the bridge was cut 

 off), if it does not merely indicate our ignorance, suggests that these may have 

 not yet had time to occupy the whole country. Before or soon after the 

 termination of the connexion the eliniate must have been at least as mild as at 

 present — at any rate, at the time of immigration of such southern forms 

 as the Lesser Horseshoe Bat and Leisler's Bat, the restricted distribution of 

 the former of which, and probably also of the latter, may be regarded as clue 

 to delicacy of constitution. The connexion of Ireland with England seems to 

 have been more recent than that of England with the Continent, since all 

 our Irish mammals, with the one exception mentioned above, are identical 

 with those of England, whereas many English mammals are distinguishable 

 from those of the neighbouring Continent. There may have been a second 

 and more recent connexion between England and the Continent, whereby 

 some of the English species, not known in Ireland, such as the Brown Hare, 

 Harvest Mouse, and Dormouse, reached that country. 



