1686 Quadrupeds . 



a kiln, and they also distinguish the animal as " The Irish Elk." These places are 

 called in Irish by a name, signifying the " Buck's Den." — H. D. Richardson ; Dublin. 

 Discovery of Bones near Saltcoats, Ayrshire. — I have read the interesting account 

 you gave in the preface to the ' Zoologist ' of the discovery made by Messrs. Glennon 

 and Nolan of Dublin. It reminded me of a somewhat similar, but much less interest- 

 ing discovery, made by me about seven years ago, for among the bones, &c, found, 

 there were no traces of the Irish giant deer, though part of the remains of many stately 

 deer were found among the buried bones. As a school was much needed in that part 

 of the town of Saltcoats which was within my parish, and too distant from the parish- 

 school of Stevington, I had succeeded in getting a handsome sum subscribed, and a 

 grant from the treasury, and ground from the Earl of Eglintoun and another proprietor, 

 and we forthwith began to level the ground for the new edifice. The spot of ground 

 which we had got, was a little eminence called Kyle's Hill or Coil's Hill, in the out- 

 skirts of Saltcoats. It had lain waste for a long time, and had been the lounging 

 place of idlers on sunny days, and often the resort of sailors' wives and sweethearts, 

 from the commanding view it gave in the distance of homeward-bound vessels. It 

 was the habitat of a few rather rare plants, one of which was Hyoscyamus niger. As 

 I had discovered a deposit of post-tertiary shells at no great distance, I gave strict 

 charges to the person who was employed to level this ground and dig for a good foun- 

 dation, to be on the outlook for shells or anything curious, and to let me know what 

 was found. As the Manse was at some distance, I could pay only occasional visits. 

 Passing one day when they were digging, I was surprised to see part of the antler of 

 a red deer turned up. When the person to whom I had given strict charges saw 

 that I regarded it with interest, he said that if he had known that I would have cared 

 for these things he could have got me a hundred of them. I asked what had become 

 of them. He said, that they had been mixed with at least a cart-load of bones, and 

 that the children who gathered them had sold bones and horns to a person who was 

 purchasing bones for manure. Expressing my regret that they had thus been lost, 

 I told him, that if any more bones or horns were found, he might send the chil- 

 dren with them to me, and I would give a higher price than the bone-gatherer. 

 Though the greater part had been disposed of, I succeeded in this manner in 

 getting a few stumps of the antlers of the red deer, only two of which, with six 

 fragments of branches, are now in my possession. The largest of these must, at one 

 time, have adorned the head of a noble animal, for it measures eight inches in circum- 

 ference at the base. I got a considerable collection of bones, which I wished to sub- 

 mit to some person skilled in comparative anatomy, but not falling in with any savant 

 of this description, they have been lost. All that I have retained is a parcel of teeth, 

 all, it is probable, of domesticated animals. I shall send you some of them, and I 

 shall be glad to learn what they are. There was the skull of a hare, and the skull, I 

 think, of a red deer, or perhaps of a smaller species, for it was not of a size correspond- 

 ing to the fragments of horn that I got. There is a part of a jawbone, containing six 

 stout teeth, one of which I shall send you. They are all striated in the inner side, a 

 circumstance which may be common, but I had not before observed it. A hundred 

 stumps of the horns of Cervus Elaphus, found buried in one place, points out a state 

 of the country very different from the present. There is not now one of these stately 

 animals in a wild state in the whole county of Ayr. It is a remarkable circumstance 

 that, as in the case of the gigantic deers' horns found in Ireland, many of the horns 

 found here were sawn through six or seven inches from the base. If the Irish deer 



