HISTORY OF THE ARTIODACTYLA 



415 



is perhaps unnecessary. ^Merycodus had deer-like antlers, 

 but completely hypsodont teeth such as no known member 

 of the Cervidae possesses. The middle Miocene species (fM. 

 osborni) was a little creature, not more than eighteen or twenty 

 inches high at the shoulder, and had a branched antler of three 

 tines, which was considerably longer than the skull, while in 

 the species of the upper Miocene (jM. furcatus) the antler 

 was shorter and simply forked. From the number of s]:)eci- 









■R--3'?i'Ct. -ostohAui 



Fig. 222. — Miocene tdeer-aiitilnpis {\M i iijiinliis oshorni, middle Miocene, and ]M. 

 furcatus, upper Miocene). Restored from specimens in the American Museum. 



mens of these animals found in which the burr is incomplete 

 or absent, it may be inferred that the antler was not always 

 deciduous. The legs were long and very slender, and appar- 

 ently there was no trace of the lateral digits, even in the fore 

 foot. These peculiar hypsodont deer persisted even in the 

 older Pleistocene. 



Deer are the only members of the Pecora which inhabit 

 South America, where there are several genera of them, all 

 much more nearly allied to North American than to Old World 



