250 
POPULAR SCIENCE REVIEW. 
The Polar Bear ( Ursus maritimus) is believed by Dr. 
Carte to have been an inhabitant of Ireland in ancient times, 
on the evidence afforded by some bones found in Lough Gur, 
in Limerick. The proportions, however, of the long bones and 
the position of the third trochanter on the inner side of the 
femur, differentiate the ursine bones in question from those of 
the polar-bear. They resemble the cave-bear more than any 
other ; but the variations presented by the remains of the 
genus Ursus are so great that in many cases it is impossible 
to determine the species. The size is of no value in dif- 
ferentiation, because in thh post-glacial and pre-historic times — 
before man had seriously entered into competition with the 
carnivores — the wild animals were as a whole much larger than 
at the present day, when they are driven from the areas where 
food is abundant. The recent specimens in most of the museums 
afford, therefore, no true guide to specific determination so far 
as relates to variation in size. The genus bear also, in com- 
mon with the hippopotamus and wild boar, present greater 
variations in form than most of the contemporary genera, and 
in very many cases I have been unable to assign the remains 
to its rightful owner. And that this feeling is shared by other 
naturalists, is shown by the appalling lists of fossil bears, which 
merely are the expression of the impossibility of assigning them 
to any one well-known form. 
We must now pass on to the history of the wolf in Britain. 
During the post-glacial age the animal was rare as compared 
with the hysenas and the bears, and its remains occur both in 
caves and river deposits. It has also been obtained from the 
pre-historic peat-bogs and alluvia in various parts of Great 
Britain. The only case within my knowledge of its remains 
being associated with the traces of the Bomans is afforded by 
the collections from Colchester, made by Dr. Bree, and already 
mentioned. After the English invasion, and the populous 
Boman province of Britain had been devastated with fire and 
sword, wolves increased to such a degree that they are deemed 
worthy of notice in the public records. At Flixton, near Filey, 
in Yorkshire, writes Camden,* an hospital was built in the 
time of iEthelstan for defending travellers from wolves (as it is 
word for word in the public records), that they should not be 
devoured by them. In the reign of one of his successors, 
Eadgar, we hear of a tribute of three hundred wolves’ heads on 
Judwal, a prince of Merioneth, who, according to William of 
Malmesbury, paid this tribute for three years, and desisted 
on the fourth, because he could not find one more.f He very 
* “Camden’s Britannia,” edit. Gibson, vol. ii. p. 110. 
f u Wil. Malm.” ii. 155, vol. i. p. 251, edit. Hardy. 
