European Elk 43 



Although agreeing with the great majority of the deer tribe in pos- 

 sessing antlers only in the male sex, the elk is as distinct from all its rela- 

 tions as the reindeer, and as easy of recognition. Therefore little need be 

 said here in the way ot description. Among the most distinctive features 

 of the elk are the shape and setting-on of the antlers. Instead of rising 

 obliquely from the forehead, these appendages in the males diverge at 

 right angles to the middle line of the face, the basal portion being 

 cylindrical and unbranched. After continuing for a short distance, this 

 beam expands suddenly into a huge concave plate of bone, the margins of 

 which are broken up into a number of finger-like snags. Even in fully 

 adult stags the lower portion of this expansion, or palmation, is separated 

 by a slit deeper than any of those between the other snags ; and in 

 younger animals this lower portion is seen to consist of two tines, and to 

 be perfectly distinct from the much larger upper portion.' Essentially, 

 therefore, elk antlers are ot a forked type, with the hinder prong much 

 larger and more expanded than the lower one. As age advances this 

 forked type tends to become more and more obliterated owing to the 

 increasing palmation of the two branches and the partial filling up of the 

 space between them. 



Apart from the antlers, there are many other striking peculiarities in 

 the form and structure of the elk. Especially noticeable is the long, 

 broad, and overhanging muzzle, which is entirely covered with hair save 

 for a small triangular patch between the nostrils. Even more remarkable 

 is the pear-shaped, hairy appendage, commonly known as the " bell," 

 hanging from the throat of the stags, the precise function of which does 

 not yet appear to have been ascertained. From an cESthetic point ot view 

 the elk is one of the most inelegant and ungainly of all warm-blooded 

 quadrupeds, and horse and cattle breeders might be disposed to say that it 

 has no shape or make in it. Nevertheless, for the exigencies of its mode of 



1 Compare the figures on pp. 50 and 53 of Deer of All Lands. 



