VARIATION OF COLOUR IN ANIMALS Ixxv 



have been killed near Keswick on one or two occasions. Mr. 

 J. W. Harris secured such a specimen from that district. 

 Melanism is comparatively rare among British Mammals. In 

 September 1884 Mr. Tom Duckworth observed a 'black' Squirrel 

 near Rose Castle, which in many parts of the Continent would 

 have been considered no uncommon event. Mr. J. Cairns 

 assures me that Major Irwin's keeper recently killed a black 

 variety of the Weasel at Lynehow. Unfortunately it was not 

 preserved. A poacher from the west of Cumberland volunteered 

 that he had once seen a black Leveret, and that the animal in 

 question changed hands in Cockermouth market. Black Rabbits 

 frequently do duty as examples of melanism. Such specimens 

 have occurred to me in localities very dissimilar to one another, 

 e.g. on Walney Island, and on the top of Whitbarrow. On the 

 whole, perhaps the most reasonable interest attaches to the 

 various types of colour exhibited by the Fallow Deer of 

 our private parks. Allusion has been made (at p. 71) 

 to the occasional occurrence of milk-white Fawns at Levens. 

 Three such animals have been produced there in the last ten 

 years. That at present tenanting the park is a Doe, bred from 

 a dark Doe. The difference between the white Fallow Deer 

 occasionally dropped at Levens, and somewhat similar individuals 

 bred at Edenhall, lies in the fact that the white Fallow Deer at 

 Edenhall are cinnamon in colour when first born, but become 

 white gradually during the first four or five years of their exist- 

 ence. The same remark would probably apply to the white 

 Fallow Deer which belong to Mr. Banks of Highmoor, Wigton. 

 On the other hand, the milk-white Deer of Levens are constantly 

 of the same shade of colour during their entire existence. 

 Though the dark form has long been preserved at Lakeland 

 (see p. 71), this variety did not compose the original stock of the 

 Levens Deer, as is generally supposed. At least Mr. T. W. 

 Holme of Sedwick stated, upwards of thirty years ago : ' There 

 are two kinds of Fallow Deer in Levens Park ; what they style 

 their old or original stock are the Spotted Deer. There are now 

 but very few of these left in the park ; the greater number being 

 the brown [i.e." black"] Deer.' 1 The greatest amount of individual 

 1 Kendal Advertiser, December 25, 1863. 



