22 THE WILD CAT OF EUROPE. 



EECORDS OF THE WILD CAT IN SCOTLAND. 



There is no very early record of the Wild Cat 

 north of the Tweed, where it continued to exist long 

 after its extinction south of that river. 



RoBEET LmosAT (' The Chronicles of Scotland,' 

 vol. ii. p. 346) gives an account of a great hunt at 

 the Earl of Athol's in 1528, in which James V. took 

 part, where a great number of large and small beasts 

 were slain, amongst them Wild Cats; and Sir Egbert 

 SiBBALD (Prodr. Hist. Nat. in Scotia illust., 1684) 

 gives a description of the Wild Cat. 



From the nature of the country and from the 

 scattered and scanty population, the Wild Cat con- 

 tinued to hold its own over the greater part of Scotland 

 until a very recent period. Bik'Gley, writing in 1809, 

 says that " in the united parishes of Loch Goil Head 

 and Kilmoricli in Argyleshire, Wild Cats are more 

 numerous than Foxes, and will at times, especially 

 when wounded, attack human beings." 



Sir Walter Scott, writing in 1824 ('Familiar 

 Letters,' 1893), states that the gardener at Lochore in 

 Fifeshire, one John Macleod, told him that he had 

 destroyed, of vermin, two Wild Cats, eight household 

 Cats gone wild, five Polecats, one of terrible size and 

 weight, which Sir Walter thinks must have been a 

 Marten Cat, five Weasels, three Whitretts, besides 

 sundry Magpies. 



SELBy (' Quadrupeds and Birds of the County 

 of Sutherland,' 1835) states that the Wild or 

 Mountain Cat is very plentiful in the mountain dis- 

 tricts, where they attain a great size, and at times 

 commit great ravages upon the young lambs in Assynt; 

 upon the Ben More range they are very numerous. 



