
silver-grey varieties are of common occurrence. Even pure albinoes with pink
eyes are not rare.
Distribution.— Professor Scharff thinks that the Rabbit originated somewhere
in or near North America, and that while its allies travelled westward, the
present species came eastward over the great lands which formerly existed in
what is now the Atlantic Ocean. We must first presume that a great Continent
(the lost Atlantis) existed at the close of the Tertiary Epoch, and this is more
than probable when we consider the form of such isolated islands as the Azores*
Madeira, and the Canaries. In support of Professor Scharffs theory, we know
that Rabbits existed on the Azores when they were first discovered, and the
Portuguese early in the fifteenth century also found these animals on Madeira1
and its adjacent islands when they first landed there.
Putting aside conjecture, we know that the earliest writers attribute a Western
European distribution to the Rabbit, and that it was known to be abundant in
Spain and Portugal, from whence it spread eastward and northward. The earliest
reference to the animal in literature is found in Polybius (circa b .c . 204), who
informs us that there were no hares in Corsica, but that there were other beasts
(kvvikXoi) which resembled hares and burrowed in the ground.
The ancients of Palestine were unacquainted with the Rabbit, but Strabo
(b .c . 50) states that it was abundant in Spain, and gives instances of the distress
caused to the inhabitants of Majorca and Minorca, who were obliged to send a
deputation to the Romans soliciting a new land, as they were driven out of their
country by the pests. Strabo also mentions the first use of ferrets as a means
of destroying Rabbits. ./Elian, who lived in the third century, also bears similar
testimony.
Some authorities distinctly state that we owe the introduction of the Rabbit
to the Romans, but there is no proof of this, or any evidence of its arrival in
this country. Its remains are not found in the peat,2 and the fact that there is
no native word for the Rabbit in any of the ancient Celtic languages8 must point
to a comparatively recent introduction of the animal.
Curiously enough, no one appears to have worked out the geographical distribution
of the Rabbit in Europe within recent years. The Carpathians seem to be
1 In opposition to this view it is confidently asserted that Rabbits were turned down on Porto Santo, Madeira, in 1418,
by one Gonzales Zareo.
* Bones o f the Rabbit have been found in a ‘ kitchen-midden ’ on the Island of Inchkeith, but the presence of these
may not argue any great age; a Rabbit might have burrowed into the mound and died there.
* See Zoologist, 1883, p. 432.
VOL. III.