106 THE ZOOLOGIST. 



these matters can scarcely be said to have been neglected or " skipped 

 over" as "common things," not " considered worth while putting 

 into print." I can hardly admit that that " blaime of burial " can lie 

 with us. We have always endeavoured to point out that, however 

 interesting the history of extinct or dying species may prove to be, 

 there is scarcely less interest in the progress of the living, and their 

 dispersal, increase, and extension of range. The outcome of such 

 records may not perhaps be so patent or useful at this present time 

 as they may become at some future date. We have so often indicated 

 the advisability of continuous recording where practicable that we 

 do not care to " rub it in " further, as it had been complained we did 

 so before ! The following is a rough summary of actual records so 

 far as I am aware : — 



Sutherland and Caithness and West Cromarty : At date of 1888 

 we had had experience of that area, and especially of the western side 

 of the watershed since 1865 ; and in square brackets or Obs. we said : 

 " It is still unknown in the west, and, so far as is known to us, in all 

 other parts of the counties" ; and, " though pet specimens have been 

 introduced, and have escaped, there is no evidence that they have 

 established themselves in a wild state" (' Fauna of Sutherland,' &c, 

 p. 71). 



In Argyll, also, when we wrote in 1892, we do not appear to have 

 possessed a single record of it in that area ; so Mr. Bolam's, in 

 1877, takes long precedence, and admits it at least to the Loch Awe 

 district. 



In the North-west Highlands — in the volume on the fauna of 

 which we bring Sutherlandshire, west of the watershed, down to date 

 of issue — we still find it absent and unrecorded in Assynt or Edder- 

 achyllis. But at Loch Broom (West Eosshire) it " appeared in 1900 

 (probably imported in baled hay) " ; auct. Sir Arthur Fowler, of 

 Inonbroom's MS. Several were seen that same year, but none since, 

 till quite recently, when — as I am informed by Mr. Alan A. Fowler — 

 " it is now not uncommon, i.e. in 1912." 



At Gareloch, North-west Eosshire, Mr. Osgood Mackenzie in- 

 formed me : " The first seen was on 16th December, 1902." And 

 now we have the earlier date, further inland, of 1888, from Mr. 

 Bolam. 



On the shores of Loch Eil, at date of 1904, we find it known on 

 the authority of the landlord at ' Coopact Inn.' Then at Loch 

 Moidart, right in the west and north side from Shiel Bridge and 

 Loch Shiel, Mr. J. C. Stewart, of Kinloch Moidart, records the first 



