DEER. 283 



their eyes, which bear the name of tear-ducts, but their 

 use is not yet understood. They would not be so much 

 developed as they are in many, unless they bore strongly 

 upon the animal's economy; but they do not com- 

 municate with the nose, nor are they in any way con- 

 nected with respiration. They are certainly in relation 

 with glands, because they secrete a greasy fluid, more 

 abundant at some times than at others, when the edges 

 are much swollen; and the animals often touch objects 

 with them, stretching them wide open, doing so when 

 they are under excitement of any kind. 



The muzzles of some deer are nearly flat, and desti- 

 tute of hair ; in others they are covered with hair, and 

 the upper lip is prehensile. 



Only the male deer have horns, or antlers, as they are 

 called, which they shed every year ; and up to a certain 

 age, at every renewal, they increase in size and number 

 of branches. They are placed on a bony pad upon the 

 forehead, which is covered with skin ; and in the second 

 year of their age, this skin swells, blood rushes towards 

 the pads, their arteries increase, and rapidly deposit 

 bony matter, the antlers begin to form, the skin increases 

 with them, and continues to cover them, and the large 

 arteries which it carries with it make furrows upon the 

 bony matter, which always remain. So thick and soft 

 is the pile of hair which protects the skin, that it deserves, 

 and has received, the name of velvet. When the antlers 

 have attained their yearly size, the arteries begin to de- 

 posit a rough ring of bone round the edges of the pad, 

 which increases till it stops their passage ; so that, de- 

 prived of their natural nourishment, the velvet shrivels 

 up, dries, and peels off ; a process which the deer hastens 

 by rubbing his antlers against trees. The antlers are 



