114 MOOSE-DEER. 



sight of the female moose belonging to the Duke of 

 Richmond, at Goodwood ; but was greatly disap- 

 pointed, when I arrived at the spot, to find that it had 

 died, after having appeared in a languishing way for 

 some time, on the morning before. However, under- 

 standing that it was not stripped, I proceeded to 

 examine this rare quadruped : I found it in an old 

 greenhouse, slung under the belly and chin by ropes, 

 and in a standing posture ; but, though it had been 

 dead for so short a time, it was in so putrid a state that 

 the stench was hardly supportable. The grand dis- 

 tinction between this deer, and any other species that 

 I have ever met with, consisted in the strange length 

 of its legs ; on which it was tilted up much in the 

 manner of the birds of the grallce order. I measured 

 it, as they do a horse, and found that, from the 

 ground to the wither, it was just five feet four inches ; 

 which height answers exactly to sixteen hands, a 

 growth that few horses arrive at: but then, with 

 this length of legs, its neck was remarkably short, 

 no more than twelve inches ; so that, by straddling 

 with one foot forward and the other backward, it 

 grazed on the plain ground, with the greatest diffi- 

 culty, between its legs : the ears were vast and lop- 

 ping, and as long as the neck ; the head was about 

 twenty inches long, and ass-like ; and had such a re- 

 dundancy of upper lip as I never saw before, with 

 huge nostrils. This lip, travellers say, is esteemed 

 a dainty dish in North America. It is very reasonable 

 to suppose, that this creature supports itself chiefiy 

 by browsing off trees, and by wading after water 

 plants ; towards which way of livelihood the length 

 of legs and great lips must contribute much. I have 

 read somewhere, that it delights in eating the nym- 

 phaa, or water lily. From the fore-feet to the belly, 

 behind the shoulder, it measured three feet and eight 

 inches ; the length of the legs, before and behind, 



