Quadrupeds. 



6317 



prosecuting their object of hunting and trapping as craftily and perti- 

 naciously, and with as much eagerness and preoccupation as the 

 savage man or the savage animal ; or pairing — for so it can only be 

 called — with an Indian woman or possibly two, perhaps with their 

 consent, perhaps after their purchase from some other trapper, perhaps 

 after a sort of Rape-of-the-Sabines wooing, and then as lightly dis- 

 solving the brief union by sale or desertion ; or, on revisiting scenes 

 of life less savage than their wonted one, indulging their animal 

 passions of sexual lust and drink and gluttony, and fighting at the 

 least provocation like so many brute beasts and with almost less 

 restraint; — they do indeed show what are the steps trodden in the 

 downward direction from civilized life to uncivilized, and so mainly 

 tend, no less than the Bushman and the Digger, to support our last 

 position, — that, if by any chance man treads in a backward order the 

 steps he has already imprinted in his passage from the uncivilized to 

 the civilized state, he, at the same time, and as if inevitably, becomes 

 clothed upon again with some of his instinctive habits and loses some 

 of the finer functions of Reason : and that, at the same time, it is most 

 difficult to attempt to define at what point, — or indeed, if at any point, 

 — this process at length stops short. 



J. C. Atkinson. 



Dan by Parsonage, Grosmont, York. 



The Black Rat (Mus rattus). — This species, usually considered rare and almost 

 extinct, has occurred in large numbers on board a ship lately arrived from Bombay: 

 whether they were on board on her departure from England, or whether she became 

 infested with thein at one of the foreign ports, I am unable to say ; but most of those 

 caught were of large size, and were probably on board for many months. With them 

 there were also a few of the common brown species, in the proportion of perhaps one 

 to three. — Robert ftPLuchlan; Forest Hill, December 13, 1858. 



Bats flying in the Sunshine. — It is not usual for bats to fly about during a bright 

 sunshine in an afternoon, as described by Mr. Holdsworth (Zool. 6257). 1 have no 

 doubt that these bats, described as of a larger size than usual, were only some old 

 ones which had been disturbed from some old building or some " ivy mantled tower ' 

 in the neighbourhood, by workmen or other intruders upon their quiet roosling-place. 

 During the last two summers bats have made their appearance at the church I attend, 

 much, I fear, to the amusement of some of the juvenile male portion of the congrega- 

 tion ; for many Sundays, as soon as the organ was played, these bats came out from 

 the belfry, near the organ, aud flew about until some of the young ones fell exhausted 

 into several of the pews of the church. — H. W. Newman. 



PS. On looking again at Mr. Holdsworth's communication I find it is dated the 

 12th of September; this was an unusually hot and sultry day for the time, — the ther- 



