1G8 MAMMALIA. 



base, with a pointed antler, and throughout the rest of its length it is 

 flattened, with the outer edge denticulated. After a certain age it 

 shrinks, and splits irregularly into several slips. This species, which 

 is the Platiteros of the ancients, has become very common in all 

 Europe, although it seems to be originally from Barbary*. A 

 black variety without spots is sometimes to be found. Those species 

 which have round antlers are more numerous ; such as inhabit tem- 

 perate climes also change their colour, more or less, during the 

 winter. 



C. elaphus, L. ; BufF. VI. ix. x. xii. (The Common Stag) (a). A 

 fawn coloured brown in summer, with a blackish line along the spine, 

 and on each side a range of small light yellow spots ; in winter of a 

 uniform greyish brown ; the crupper and tail always of a pale yellow. 

 It is a native of the forests of all Europe, and of the temperate 

 parts of Asia. The antlers of the male are. round, and appear in 

 the second year, at first simple, and then with tines or branches on 

 their inner face, which increase in number as they advance in age, 

 forming a kind of palm with many small points. When very old the 

 Stag becomes blackish, and the hairs on the neck lengthen and stand 

 erect. The horns are shed in the spring, the old ones losing them 

 first ; they are reproduced in the summer, during the whole of whicli 

 period they live separately. "Wlien they are grown again, the rutting 

 season commences, which lasts three months, and during which 

 period the males become furious. Both sexes unite in large herds to 

 pass the winter. The hind carries eight months, and brings forth in 

 May. The fawn is spotted with white. 



The Stag-hunt, which is regarded as the noblest of sports, is 

 become the subject of an art, which has its theory and its voluminous 

 nomenclature, in which the most familiar objects are expressed in 

 the most strange terms, or entirely altered from their usual import. 



C. canadensis, Gm. ; C. strongyloceros, Schreb. 246, A. 247, 

 F. G; Wapiti, &c. (The Elk.) A fourth larger than the Elk of 

 Europe, and nearly of the some colour, but the disk of the crupper 

 broader and paler ; the antlers equally round, but more developed, 

 and without a palm. Inhabits all the temperate parts of North 

 America. 



C. virginianus, Gm. ; Schreb. CCXLVII. H. (The Virginia, or 



* Since the publication of the second ed. of my Oss. Foss., we have received a 

 wild C. dama, killed in the woods to the south of Tunis. 



^g° (a) The antler of the Stag is a real bone; it falls off every year and is re- 

 newed. It is so united to the bone of the forehead that it ought to be regarded as a 

 portion of it, yet it is separated every season, in consequence of the absorption of 

 the substance at its bottom which unites it to the bone of the forehead. The suc- 

 ceeding antler is at first no more than a piece of cartilege, which gradually becomes 

 bone. Castration impedes the growth, and either alters the appearance or stops al- 

 together the renewal of the horn. The shavmgs of the horn of the Stag, commonly 

 called Hartshorn, are used in medicine: it cons.sts of the raspings of the internal 

 part of the horn, one hundred parts of which yield twenty-seven parts of gelatine. 

 An alkaline salt is obtained from the horns, and from that again the volatile liquid 

 is obtained, called spirit of hartshorn.— Eng. Ed. 



