DEER. 



83 



other regions when we come to the deer, since, with the 

 exception of the Barbary stag, there is no representative of 

 the group in all that continent. With few exceptions, deer 

 are characterized by the antlers of the males, the reindeer 

 alone having these appendages in both sexes. They are 

 the only true ruminants found in South America, where 

 many of the species have comparatively simple antlers, and 

 thus show affinity with the early fossil types, some of 

 which were antlerless. Allied species range through North 

 America, but it is not till the north of that continent is 

 reached that we find in the wapiti a representative of our 

 own red deer. The red deer group extends through Europe 



FIG. 29. Skull of Sivathere, from the Pliocene of India. 



and a large part of Central Asia, but in India and the 

 Malayan region it is replaced by the rusine deer, like the 

 sambar, in which the antlers (Fig. 30, a) lack the bez-tine 

 of the red deer (ibid, &). Other marked varieties of antler 

 are exhibited by the elk, the fallow deer, and the reindeer; 

 but none of these approach those of the extinct Irish deer 

 (Fig. 25), which may have an eleven feet span from tip to 



