Prior Existence of the Castor Fiber in Scotland. 79 



the course of these, was placed in my hands, and to whose 

 intelligent observation I am chiefly indebted for the particulars 

 of its discovery. In digging about twenty yards from the 

 margin, and after penetrating a thickness of moss of about 

 eight feet, the marl was reached, and upon its surface was 

 found a skull, in excellent preservation,* easily recognised by 

 me, on examining it, as that of a beaver. Either no other 

 parts of the skeleton had remained preserved in its contiguity, 

 or they had failed to attract the attention of the workmen ; the 

 probability being that, from the slighter texture of most of the 

 other bones, they had been less able to resist entire disintegra- 

 tion, or had crumbled on exposure. The remains of deer and 

 other animals were also discovered on the surface of the marl, 

 at about the same distance from the margin ; but, at other 

 places, the horns and bones of deer, and among these a lower 

 maxilla, were found fourteen feet beneath the marl itself, yet 

 still within its layers, or at about an aggregate depth of twenty- 

 two feet. Among the remains preserved and placed before me 

 were horns of the red-deer, with metatarsal bones, evidently 

 also of animals of the deer species, all betokening individuals 

 of once stately dimension ; while the left tibia of an ox, doubt- 

 less the Bos primigenius, which was found imbedded at a 

 depth of seven feet within the marl, I computed must have 

 belonged to an animal measuring at least six feet, or, with the 

 hoof and soft parts entire, fully half a foot more to the summit 

 of the shoulder. The moss, at the part covering these remains, 

 might be viewed as divided into three layers. The upper of 

 these, approaching to about three feet in thickness, consisted 

 of the traces of comparatively fresh vegetation : the second 

 layer, measuring about two feet, had a less firm consistence, 

 and changed its colour of a greenish brown, when moist and 

 newly exposed, to almost a white when dry : the third layer 

 extended to about four feet, but in some places to a much 

 greater thickness, and was almost black, holding imbedded, 

 in various grades of preservation, many and not mean remains 

 of the primeval forests, such as trunks of trees, for the most 

 part hazel and birch, with an intermingling of oak, some 

 measuring from two to even four feet in diameter ; and, along 

 with these, large quantities of hazel nuts, heaped into masses, 

 as if gathered and swept from the upper woodlands by 

 the mountain freshets. In some places gravel was found 



* The skull is now placed in tlie Museum of the Tweedside Physical and 

 Antiquarian Society at Kelso ; a remarkable collection, considering its position 

 in a small country town, but which would have fulfilled a better design, and one 

 more worth adopting elsewhere, had it been restricted, as originally planned, to 

 the illustration exclusively of the Natural History and Antiquities of the im- 

 mediately surrounding district. 



