Southern (American J Elk. 37 



Cerf de Canada ? Memoires pour servir a L'Histoire 

 Naturelle des Animaux. Second. Part., p. 231, 

 &c, pi. 46. 



The Alcos of New- Mexico ? Clavigero's History of 

 Mexico. Vol. ii. p. 287. 



I proceed to give some account of a species of deer, 

 which has been most strangely overlooked by the 

 greater number of the systematic writers on zoology. 

 Indeed, I cannot find that it is distinctly mentioned 

 by any of them. This animal is generally known in 

 Pennsylvania, and in other parts of the United- States, 

 by the name of the Elk. Our hunters, and my coun- 

 trymen in general, restrict this name exclusively to 

 the species of which I am treating, and never, that I 

 have heard, apply it to the Moose. As the moose, 

 however, is well known, in Europe, by the name of 

 Elk, it has been imagined, by some eminent zoolo- 

 gists*, that the animal which is called Elk in Ame- 

 rica, is specifically the same as the Elk of Europe. 

 This similarity of name has, I believe, been the prin- 

 cipal cause of that confusion, which is so conspicuous 

 in the accounts which writers have given of the moose. 

 They have confounded the last-mentioned animal and 

 the American Elk with each other, and have so blend- 

 ed the natural history of the one with the other, that 

 it is somewhat difficult to remove the confusion. 

 (See Note 1.) I shall show, however, that they are 

 two species very distinct from each other. 



* Zimmerman, Gmelin, Sec. 



