Ballantyne Press BALLANTYNE AND HANSON, EDINBURGH

CHANDOS STREET, LONDON

WITH ILLUSTRATIONS BY 7. WOLF, C. WHYMPER,

R. W. SHERWIN, AND OTHERS

LONDON

TRÜBNER AND CO., LUDGATE HILL

1880

(All rights reserved]

Zgo.o942

1984. Jan. minst rinnel

12)

And in yon wither'd bracken’s lair,
Slumbered the wolf and shaggy bear;
Once on that lone and trackless sod
High chiefs and mail-clad warriors trod,
And where the roe her bed has made,
Their last bright arms the vanquish'd laid.

!

1

The days of old have passed away
Like leaves upon the torrent grey,
And all their dreams of joy and woe,
As in yon eddy melts the spow;
And soon as far and dim behind,
We too shall vanish on the wind.

Lays of the Deer Forest.

PREFACE.

FEW who have studied the literature of British Zoology can have failed to remark the

gap

which exists between Owen's “British Fossil Mammals and Birds,” and Bell's “British Quadrupeds;" the former dealing chiefly with prehistoric remains, the latter with species which are still existing.

Between these two admirable works a connecting link, as it were, seems wanting in the shape of a history of such animals as have become extinct in Britain within historic times, and to supply this is the aim of the present writer. Of the materials collected, during many years

of research, some portion has been already utilized in a Lecture delivered by the author before the “Hertfordshire Natural History Society,” in October, 1879, and in several articles in the Popular Science Review and the natural history columns of The Field.

The exigencies of time and space, however, neces* Popular Science Review, 1878, pp. 53, 141, 251, 396; and The Field, 1879 : Sept. 27; Oct. 4, 11 ; Nov. 1, 8, 29; Dec. 20 and 27.