MAMMALS 7 February, 1891, an account is given of the capture of a badger in a wood-yard in Thornton Lane ; and the Saturday Herald of 30 May, 1891, reports the capture of another specimen of 40 Ib. weight by Mr. C. J. Isaac, at Loughborough, on 27 May. The late Mr. T. Spencer informed me on 28 August, 1891, of four badgers being caught at Norton by Galby (Norton Gorse), two old and two young ; three were killed, the other, an old one, escaped. Mr. W. J. Horn, writing to me in 1 906, says : ' There is a badger-earth at Thorpe Langton, and there must be others in the fox-coverts, as one reads occasionally of a badger being killed by the fox-hounds so recently as in November, 1906, in Sheepthorns, a fox-cover near Kibworth.' Mr. H. Butler Johnson informs me that a badger was caught in the autumn of 1906 in a drain on the Belton Road near Grace Dieu. That badgers will live in amity with foxes is vouched for by Col. J. M. Fawcett, who told me (January, 1907) that many inhabit Hungerton Fox- holes, and their hoarse cries may often be heard at night. 1 8. Otter. Lutra lutra, Linn. Bell Lutra vulgaris. Resident, but rare. Harley recorded that, in his day, it was occasionally found on the banks of the Rivers Soar, Trent, and Wreak. He was present at the capture of a female otter and four young ones in the spring of 1817. The young otters were taken from a rude lair, matted with rushes and flags, which the dam had carefully conveyed through a hole and concealed within a decayed pollard willow on the banks of the River Soar near to the upper mills in the parish of Loughborough. On being surprised, the old otter fought the dogs furiously, and was with difficulty overcome. The young, which had attained to the size of a large water-rat, were still blind. 'J. B.', writing in the Leicester Chronicle and Mercury, 28 February, 1885, mentioned that a large otter, stuffed and in a case, had been at the Narborough Inn for many years past, and was believed to have been shot by the late Mr. W. Sansome. In 1885 I called at the Narborough Inn, when the late Miss Sansome kindly showed me the above-mentioned specimen large, but wretchedly mounted ; it was shot between fifty and sixty years before. The Leicester Museum formerly possessed one killed near Enderby, on 28 September, 1849. Mr. N. C. Curzon, of Lock- ington Hall, informed me that a large female otter was killed there in October, 1877. Loughborough seems to have kept up its breed of otters since Harley's time ; for seeing a notice in the local papers as to the shooting by the water-keeper of two young otters in the River Soar, near the ' Big Meadow,' Lough- borough, one evening in March, 1884, I sent a telegram on the 22nd to Mr. Dakin, a fishmonger of that town, hoping to get the specimens for the museum, and received a reply : ' Two were killed, but only one obtained. There are more about.' The late Mr. R. Widdowson, writing on 6 February, 1885, said ; ' I heard last week of one being seen at Brentingby ; I had one some years ago from the same locality.' Mr. H. Smith, of Burton Street, Melton Mowbray, informed me, in November, 1885, that there were a good many otters in that neighbourhood, both above and below Bishop's Mill.' The late Dr. Macaulay sent me a note given by the Rev. H. Parry, of Tugby Vicarage, of a fine dog otter killed 19 December, 1888, in the Eye Brook, between Lod- dington Redditch and 'Tugby Bushes.' Lucas, the keeper at Stapleford Park, appears to have seen several there, and reports that in 1887 he shot a female, and saw as many as five at one time during that year. He also caught one on 8 March, 1889, and saw a very fine one on 7 April of the same year. On 25 April, 1 889, a female and two cubs were killed at Narborough Bogs, and were chronicled in the Leicester papers. A female specimen in the Leicester Museum was killed whilst coming from its lair on land belonging to Mr. Hill, on the banks of the Soar, 'Old Nook,' Syston, on 12 August, 1891. Mr. H. Smith, of Mill Lane, Melton Mowbray, obtained a young specimen, about one stone in weight, on 28 January, 1892, Mr. F. Bouskell informed me that he saw an otter in the canalized River Soar, halfway between Barrow and Loughborough, on 10 April, 1892, when in company with Messrs. S. and W. Harris. Mr. W. Hubbard, grazier, of Brentingby, shot a very fine otter on the River Eye, near Burbage's new covert, in October, 1892." The late Dr. Macaulay informed me that there was an otter in the brook at Kibworth on 27 December, 1893, and the brook being in flood, he thought the animal had probably come up from the Welland, some eight miles below. In 1892 a male otter, and in 1894 a female, were shot in the Narborough Bogs, and presented to the Leicester Museum by Mr. J. Taylor. The Rev. Hugh Parry told me that the keeper, Charles Spencer, killed a fine dog otter on 23 April, 1 894, at Tugby. Mr. T. B. Cartwright, writing circa 1895 from the Mill House, Loughborough, informed me that he had secured two otters shot in the Soar at Loughborough. Mr. F. Crick records a dog otter caught in 1897 by a shepherd and his dog in the small brook running by the golf-links, Cosby. It had killed fourteen young ducks. RODENTIA 1 9. Squirrel. Sciurui leucourus, Kerr. Bell Sciurus vulgaris. Resident and generally distributed, and has been seen so near Leicester as in a field close to Aylestone Mill on 24 October, 1885. A curious, though not very uncommon, example, exhibiting malformation of the teeth in this animal, was presented to the Leicester Museum by Mr. R. Wingate, on 18 April, 163 1876. In this specimen the upper incisors have become prolonged and curved into a half-circle. No locality is given with the specimen, and I there- fore assume it to have been a caged animal, fed, doubtless, upon food too soft to allow the natural grinding of the teeth necessary to prevent such malfor- mation. A young squirrel caught near Narborough was kept in captivity for about six years, in the family of
- Daily Mercury, 12 Oct. 1892.
