320 BRITISH MAMMALS 



fragments of antlers belonged to a deer identical with Cervus 

 elaphus maral. 



The typical red deer seem to have reached the British Islands 

 relatively late in the Pleistocene period, some time after the 

 arrival of man. Professor ScharfF thinks the first form to arrive 

 was the small red deer from the Spanish Peninsula (see p. 319). 

 This was followed by the big, normal red deer from Germany and 

 Belgium. The red deer gradually displaced the " maral " type, 

 and pushed the reindeer farther and farther north till it took 

 possession of their feeding-grounds altogether. In Great Britain 

 and Ireland the red deer, in Prehistoric times, developed antlers 

 far more magnificent than any which are grown at the present 

 day, except it be in certain cases of almost artificial park 

 develbpment. 



The present habitat of the typical wild red deer is restricted 

 to the following countries and districts : — In the United Kingdom 

 it is found (wild) in the county of Kerry, in Ireland ; on Exmoor 

 (Devonshire and Somerset) ; in the Highland counties of 

 Scotland and most of the great islands along the west coast of 

 Scotland, including Harris, in the Hebrides. It is found on the 

 island of Hetteren only in the kingdom of Norway, but it is also 

 met with in the southern provinces of Sweden. In Spain it is 

 fairly abundant, and perhaps in the border regions and the Serra 

 d'Estrella of Portugal. But the Spanish race is thought to be 

 more allied to the North African stock. Possibly it is the result 

 of a fusion of both types, for the heads of deer which are shot in 

 Northern Spain can scarcely be distinguished from the antlers of 

 British or French stags of not over-good development. The red 

 deer is found in France wherever it has been preserved, but it is 

 hardly, perhaps, as near a wild state in any part of that country as 

 it is in Scotland. It is extinct in Italy and in Switzerland. 

 Germany and Austria are its best centres of development at the 

 present day, and from those countries come the finest heads and 

 the biggest stags. In fact, the British deer are being very much 

 Germanised. Constant importations of stags from Germany and 

 Austria during the nineteenth century have sensibly modified the 



