1826.] Scientific Notices — Zoology, 307 



Mr. Hart's description is as follows : — " This magnificent 

 skeleton is perfect in every single bone of the framework which 

 contributes to form a part of its general outline: the spine, the 

 chest, the pelvis, and the extremities, are all complete in this 

 respect ; and when surmounted by the head and beautifully 

 expanded antlers, which extend out to a distance of nearly six 

 feet on either side, forms a splendid display of the reliques of 

 the former grandeur of the animal kingdom, and carries back the 

 imagination to a period when whole herds of this noble animal 

 wandered at large over the face of the country. To proceed 

 with a description of the several parts of this specimen in detail, 

 I shall commence v/ith the horns, which give the animal its 

 chief characteristic feature. The /lonis. — That the description 

 of these may be the more intelligible, I will first explain the 

 terms which I mean to apply to their several parts. Each horn 

 consists of the socket or root, the burr or coionary circle, the 

 beam or shaft, the palm and the antlers. The socket or root is 

 the part of the horn which grows out of the frontal bone, and 

 which is never shed ; it is smooth, of a brown colour, an inch 

 and half in length, and eleven inches three quarters in circumfe- 

 rence ; in the animal's life time it was covered by the skin. The 

 coronary or bead-like circle, or burr, is a ring of small, hard, 

 whitish prominences, resembling a string of pearls, which encir- 

 cles the junction of the socket with the part of the horn which 

 falls annually from the heads of all deer. The beam or s/iaj't 

 extends outwards with a curvature, the concavity of which looks 

 downwards and backwards. This part is nearly cylindrical at 

 its root, and its length equals about one-fourth of that of the 

 whole horn ; its outer end is spread out and flattened on its 

 upper surface, and is continuous with the palm, which expands 

 outwards in a fan-like form, the outer extremity of which mea- 

 sures two feet ten inches across, being its broadest part. Where 

 the beam joins the palm, the horn undergoes a kind of twist, the 

 eflPect of which on the palm is, to place its edges above and 

 below, and its surfaces anterior and posterior ; the anterior sur- 

 face is convex, and looks outwards ; the posterior is concave, 

 and its surface looks towards that of the opposite palm. Such 

 is the position of the horns, when the head is so placed that the 

 zygomatic arch is parallel to the horizon, as it v/ould be during 

 progression, or whilst the animal stands in an easy posture. The 

 antlers are the long pointed processes which project from the 

 horns, two of which grow from the beam anteriorly ; the first 

 comes off' immediately from the root, and is directed downwards, 

 overhanging the orbit ; this is called the brow antler, which in 

 this specimen is divided into two points at its extremity.* The 



• I have seen tliis antler divided into three points in two specimens, one at the Earl 

 of Bcsborough's, county Kilkenny, (wliich measured eigJit feet four inches between the 

 tips,) the other in the hall of the Museum of Trinity College: it is single in the greater 

 number of specimens, rd in tho«c which t'uvier describes, 



x2 



