lviii PROLEGOMENA 



Order RODENTIA . Fam. CASTORIDM. 



BEAVER. 



Castor fiber, L. 



The only evidence of the former existence of this animal in 

 Lakeland was brought to light by Mr. J. G. Goodchild. The 

 following note includes all the information regarding this im- 

 portant find that he has as yet placed on record : * A few years 

 back [i.e. prior to 1883] the people at the Cross Keys Inn, 

 Cautla, between Eessondale and Sedbergh, had on the mantel- 

 piece of their sitting-room the skull of an adult Beaver. This 

 was obtained from some alluvium in the bottom of the Eesson- 

 dale valley, near Clouds, and is worth recording as one of the 

 few instances, if not the sole instance, of the former occurrence 

 of this animal in Westmorland.' 1 



BIRD BONES FROM THE ROCK FISSURES OF 

 HELSFELL, WESTMORLAND. 



We owe to the splendid industry of John Beecham the only 

 avian remains discovered, so far as my present information goes, 

 in the Lake District. They were uniformly obtained from 

 Helsfell. Some of them were placed, undetermined, in the 

 Kendal Museum. Others, including remains of Buteo, turned 

 up when I searched Mr. Beecham's private collection. Having 

 obtained the loan of the bones belonging to the Museum through 

 the kind offices of Mr. Joseph Severs, I sent the whole series to 

 Mr. R. Lydekker, who has made the subject of Fossil Birds 

 peculiarly his own. The results of this examination are admittedly 

 small, but they show the desirability of further research in the 

 same direction. The following is Mr. Lydekker's report : — 



■ The bird bones submitted to me from the caves and rock 



fissures of the Lake District are eleven in number, and belong 



to four species, viz., seven to a Goose, one to a Fowl, two to a 



Buzzard, while the eleventh is a radius which I am unable to deter- 



1 Trans. Cumh. Assoc, No. viii. p. 213. 



