MAMMALS. 
73 
to turn to the pages of Bell's British Quadrupeds to be con- 
firmed in the opinion. The following is a contribution to 
this part of the subject. One of the Duke of Sutherland's 
gamekeepers, who takes special charge of the hatching- 
boxes for salmon, near Inchnadamph, stated that after he 
had liberated the yoiing fry into the ditch-like burn of clear 
limestone water which runs past the hatching-house, he 
saw what he believed was a water-rat, and on firing, shot a 
water shrew which he found had been eating the young 
fish in this pool. Harvie-Brown believes he was the first 
person to draw the said keeper's attention to the existence 
of the species on the limestone burns of Assynt ; and the 
keepers also on the Inver river are now acquainted with 
it. But at the same time it would be unfair to lay all 
the blame for the destruction of fry upon this interesting 
little animal, — which, no doi;bt, is much more numerous 
over Scotland than is generally supposed, — because there is 
a water-bug well known to us which is probably much 
more numerous and much more destructive to fry than 
Sorex is. Besides, Sorex, being an insect- feeder too, should 
perhaps be allowed to take his fill of fry, in consideration 
of his anti-coleopteric inclinations. We cannot, at present, 
positively make affirmation as to the presence of this beetle 
in Sutherland limestone streams, but we can certify to their 
carnivorous proj^ensities, as we have watched them in fresh- 
water aquaria in our own house at Dunipace. 
As long ago as the days of Pennant, the water shrew is 
spoken of thus in the Caledonian Zoology : " It is the 
Lavellan of some places, supposed to be noxious to 
animals " ; but in his Biitish Zoology the author expresses 
himself wdth somewhat less confidence. Speaking of this 
animal he says : " I imagine it to be the same that the 
inhabitants of Sutherland call the water mole, and those 
of Caithness the Lavellan, which the last imagine 
poisons their cattle," etc. Again, Sibbald [Scotia Illustrata, 
