156 



ZOOLOGY. 



[Part IT. 



design of this structure, that it is to enable the reindeer to 

 shovel under the snow in order to reach the lichens be- 

 neath it ; but I apprehend that another use of it has been 

 overlooked, that of facihtating its movements in search 

 of food by increasing the difficulty of its sinking in the 

 snow. 



A formation precisely analogous in the buffalo seems 

 to point to a corresponding design. The ox, whose 

 life is spent on firm ground, has the bones of the foot 

 so constructed as to afford the most sohd support to 

 an animal of its great weight ; but in the buffalo, 

 which dehghts in the morasses on the margins of 

 pools and rivers, the formation of the foot resembles 

 'that of the reindeer. The tarsi in front extend almost 

 horizontally from the upright bones of the leg, and 

 spread Avidely on touching the ground ; the hoofs are 

 flattened and broad, with the extremities turned up- 

 wards ; and the false hoofs descend behind till, in walk- 

 ing, they make a clattering sound. In traversing the 

 marshes, this combination of abnormal incidents serves to 

 give extraordinary breadth to the foot, and not only pre- 

 vents the buffalo from sinking inconveniently in soft 

 ground^, but at the same time presents no obstacle to 

 the withdrawal of his foot from the mud. 



Deer. — " Deer," says the truthful old chronicler, 

 Eobert Knox, " are in great abundance in the woods, 

 from the largeness of a cow to the smallness of a hare, 

 for here is a creature in this land no bigger than the 

 latter, though every part rightly resembleth a deer : it 

 is called meminna, of a grey colour, with white spots 

 and good meat."^ The httle creatm^e which thus dwelt 

 in the recollection of the old man, as one of the memo- 



^ Professor O^ven has noticed a 

 similar fact regardin<? the rudiments 

 of the second and fiftli digits in the 

 instance of the elk and bison, which 

 have them largely expanded where 

 they inhabit swampy gTound ; whilst 



they are nearly obliterated in the 

 camel and dromediuy, which traverse 

 arid deserts. — Owen on Limbs, p. 34 j 

 see also Bell on the Hand, ch. iii. 



^ Knox's Relation, ^-c., book i. 

 c.C. 



