1 66 The Irish Naturalist, May, 



The Irish Giant Deer (Cervus (Megaceros) giganteus) possessed 

 undoubtedly the upper or proximal splint-bones only, and 

 must, therefore, be placed with most of the other Old World 

 Deer among the Plesiometacarpi, and not with the Reindeer 

 among the Telemetacarpi. The other characters alluded to 

 by Sir Victor Brooke which might be utilized in distinguishing 

 the two divisions of Deer from one another are those that Prof. 

 Lonnberg principally relied upon in his endeavour to remove 

 the Irish Giant Deer from the genus Cervus 



The first of these characters is that, in what we might call by 

 the term Old World Deer (Plesiometacarpi), the posteriorportion 

 of the nasal cavity is not divided by the vomer into two distinct 

 chambers, while in the New World Deer including Reindeer 

 (Telemetacarpi) it is so divided. The vomer, I may mention, 

 is usually a thin, flat bone forming a complete or incomplate 

 septum between the hinder part of the nostrils. Prof. Lonnberg 

 makes the statement that the vomer in Megaceros, that is to 

 say, in our Irish Giant Deer, divides the posterior nostrils into 

 two completely separate passages. 



I have examined several skulls of the Irish Elk, and though 

 the vomer, like all the bones in the skull, is much thickened, 

 it is not really attached to the palatine bone, but free from it 

 as in the Red-deer and Fallow Deer. A thin blade of a knife 

 can be passed in all cases between the palatine and vomer up 

 to a distance varying from if to 2\ inches, corresponding to 

 the length of the former bone, which is much thickened in the 

 Giant Deer. In the Reindeer, on the other hand, the vomer 

 is firmly attached to the palatine bone and to the posterior 

 edge of it. 



Prof. Lonnberg lays particular stress on the sinallness of the 

 antorbital vacuity in the Giant Deer as compared with that of 

 the Fallow Deer, in which respect it approaches the condition 

 noticed in the Reindeer. All typical Deer possess such a 

 vacuity. In the young Giant Deer and in female skulls it is 

 prominent, but in old males this vacuity tends to disappear, and 

 in some cases has been almost entirely covered in by the 

 growth of the surrounding bony tissue. This condition of the 

 adult Giant Deer is, therefore, not of any importance in classi- 

 fication. 



