6 BRITISH MAMMALS 



descend below the level of the water, we derive but little aesthetic 

 enjoyment from fish, and though they are estimable as a food 

 supply, their natural domain is so vast that the only mammal who 

 can ever bring any species of them near extinction is man himself. 

 The present writer has little sympathy with those well- 

 meaning but misdirected persons who, loving the Mammalia, and 

 feeling starved in their affections as British residents, introduce 

 into their parks and domains kangaroos, African antelopes, 

 ostriches, or Indian humped cattle. What they ought to do 

 (what some great landowners have done) is to reinforce and 

 protect dwindling British species, and reintroduce those lost 

 forms which were co-existent with man in prehistoric times, and 

 which may still be found lingering in holes and corners of 

 Europe, Asia, and North America. One does not wish to be 

 unreasonable ; and few would propose the letting loose of lions 

 in the hope of re-developing a Felis spelaa, or the turning out 

 of Indian elephants to stand the climate as best they might and 

 gradually recover the shaggy hair and the tusks of the mammoth. 

 These creatures, and the spotted hyaena, leopard, glutton, and 

 hippopotamus, might prove too antagonistic to human comfort 

 and prosperity in these crowded islands : we must be content to 

 keep them in menageries. But there is no reason why we should 

 not prudently reintroduce the European bison, the musk ox, 

 the reindeer, the boar ; perhaps the bear, the beaver, the saiga 

 antelope, the lynx, and the wolf. We might use all our efforts 

 to stimulate the wild white cattle of the northern parks, for- 

 bidding the destruction of red and black calves, and so hoping 

 that, in time, they might regain the stature and appearance of 

 their forefather the aurochs. Horses of the Connemara breed 

 might be encouraged to run wild in paradises like Achill Island 

 and the New Forest till they reverted to the appearance of 

 Prjevalski's horse. Of course, if these islands are to contain 

 a population of (say) a hundred millions, it must be at the 

 expense of destroying all beauty and all specially British charac- 

 teristics of landscape, fauna, and flora. No doubt, without 

 detriment to the picturesque, the population of Ireland might 



