252 SEXUAL SELECTION : MAMMALS. Part H. 



doing this, lie suddenly springs up, throwing up his 

 head at the same time, an'l can thus wound or perhaps 

 even transfix his antagonist. Both animals always kneel 

 down so as to guard as far as possible against tiiis 

 manoeuvre. It has been recorded that one of these 

 antelopes has used his horns with effect even against a 

 lion ; yet from being forced to place his head between 

 the fore-legs in order to bring the points of the horns 

 forward, he would generally be under a great dis- 

 advantage when attacked by any other animal. It is, 

 therefore, not probable that the liorns have been modified 

 into their present great length and peculiar position, as 

 a protection against beasts of prey. We can, however, 

 see that as soon as some ancient male progenitor of the 

 Oryx acquired moderately long horns, directed a little 

 backwards, he would be compelled in his battles with 

 rival males to bend his head somewhat inwards or down- 

 wards, as is now done by certain stags ; and it is not 

 improbable that he might have acquired the habit of 

 at first occasionally and afterwards of regularly kneel- 

 ing down. In this case it is almost certain that the 

 males which possessed the longest liorns would have 

 had a great advantage over others with shorter horns ; 

 and then the horns would gradually have been ren- 

 dered longer and longer, through sexual selection, until 

 they acquired their present extraordinary length and 

 position. 



With stags of many kinds the branching of the horns 

 offers a curious case of difficulty ; for certainly a single 

 straight point would inflict a much more serious wound 

 than several diverging points. In Sir Philip Egerton's 

 museum there is a horn of the red-deer (^Cervus ela- 

 phus) thirty inches in length, with " not fewer than 

 " fifteen snags or branches ;" and at Moritzburg there 

 is still preserved a pair of antlers of a red- deer, shot in 



