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Anna, Illinois, that : " The Virginia deer of the Pacitic States are smaller 

 than those of" the same latitude in the Central and Eastern States ; and 

 I do not think that tlie deer of Texas will average more than one halt 

 of the weight of the deer of Wisconsin and Michigan. From all 1 can 

 learn on the subject it seems that the virginian deer of the Western 

 States are smaller than those of the same latitude in the Eastern States ; 

 and it is certainly true that the further south we go the smallsr we find 

 the deer." A beautifully formed variety of this species is called the 

 " spike-born." This lovely animal, although identical in colour and 

 habits with the branching-horned type of the species, is much rounder, 

 shorter and thicker in body, and has a more elegantly shaped head. 

 The true spike-horned deer has straight, sliai-p antlei's, from six inches 

 to a foot in length, setting backwards like the horns of the African oryx, 

 which renders him a formidable and generally victorious antagonist in 

 the periodical combats which take place between the male knights 

 errant of the deer tribes. These conflicts are often desperate and' 

 protracted. I have seen a space in the woods fully one quarter of an 

 aci*e in size, after a light snow in November, all trampled over, the soil 

 torn up, and small dead trees uprooted in all directions, as the evidences 

 of one of these fierce battles of chivalry. I was told by a " still-hunter," 

 on the Madawaska River, who killed one hundred and fifty deer in one 

 season, (how is that compared with the milder and less sanguinary mode 

 of dog hunting?) that during the same year he came upon two large 

 bucks in the act or fighting, and getting easily within thirty yards, 

 killed both. In such conflicts the animals occasionally get their horns 

 interlocked beyond the ])0wer of extrication, and both die of starvation 

 as a rule. I have sesn two heads interlocked, facing each other, so 

 tightly that a strong man could not separate them. I am indebted to 

 Mr. James Fletcher for a copy of the London Field, containing the 

 photograi)h of a head of the most extraordinarily shajied liorns which I 

 have yet seen. The same paper contains another photograph of 

 two heads with the horns interlocked together, side by side, while 

 fighting. They were fastened to each other in such a firm manner that 

 nothing but the shedding of the horns could have freed them. When 

 found the pi'isoners wex'e alive and in good conditio :i. In both cases 

 the animals were of the virginian species. This beautiful deer is found 



