LINNEAN SOCIKTT OP LONDON. I3 



On behalf of Mrs. Mivart the Zoological Secretary presented for the 

 acceptance of the Society a half-length portrait in oils of the late 

 Dr. St. George Mivart, F.R.S., F.L.S., a former Vice-President. 

 On the motion of the Chairman, a cordial vote of thanks for so 

 acceptable a gift was passed, and an intimation thereof was directed 

 to be conveyed to the donor. 



Mr. J. E. Harting, F.L.S., exhibited and made remarks on some 

 photographs of female Roedeer (Capreolus capred) bearing antlers, 

 one of which had been shot at Neudau, in East Styria, in December 

 last. This animal, which was very fat, weighed 47 lb. 6*oz. A 

 careful examination of the reproductive organs showed that its 

 condition was perfectly normal, and that it differed in no respect 

 from an ordinary doe of this species except in having horns. It 

 was considered by the foresters who examined it to be three or four 

 years old, and, in their opinion, from the appearance of the teats it 

 was a doe which had never paired. The horns, which were bifur- 

 cated and of a type common in the Austrian Tyrol, measured about 

 4^ inches in length. 



Mr. H. J. Elwes, F.R.S., considered the case so remarkable and 

 unusual, as to suggest the probability of some mistake having been 

 made in determining the sex. Mr. Harting, in reply, stated that 

 this was by no means unique. In Germany, where Roedeer are 

 much more plentiful than in this country, several does with antlers 

 had been recorded. Dr. Altum in his 'Eorstzoologie' (Bd. i. p. 211) 

 states that many such cases were known to him. One instance 

 noted in the Black Forest at Kippenheim is mentioned in ' The 

 Zoologist,' 1866, p. 435. In that case the horns were " in the 

 velvet," but perfectly hard ; one was about 6 in. long with a single 

 short tine, the other about 3 in. without any tine. A female Roe 

 with budding horns was shot in October 1875 by Mr. Duncan 

 Davidson of Inchmarlo, Banchory, Aberdeenshire. The skull of 

 another in the Museum of the Royal College of Surgeons, forwarded 

 from Petworth Park, Sussex, by Lord Egremont is figured in the 

 Proceedings of the Zoological Society, 1879, p. 297. 



Dr. Godman observed that, although he had had considerable 

 experience of deer in Scotland (both Red-deer and Roe), he had 

 never come across so remarkable and abnormal a case. 



Mr. Harting pointed out that such cases were not confined to the 

 genus Capreolus, but had been noted rarely in Cervus elaplius, and 

 once in the case of the American White-tailed Deer, Cariacus virgi- 

 nianus (shot in East Kootenay, British Columbia), a photograph of 

 which he exhibited. It was well known that there is an intimate 

 connection between the reproductive organs and the growth of 

 antlers ; and it was not unreasonable to suppose that the phe- 

 nomenon of antlers on a female deer (except in the case of the 

 Reindeer and Cariboo, which normally carried them) might be due 

 to some abnormal condition of the ovarios or other parts of the 

 genital organs. 



