114 The Natural History of Selborne 



with the greatest difficulty, between its legs ; the ears were vast and 

 lopping, and as long as the neck ; the head was about twenty inches 

 long, and ass-like ; and had such a redundancy 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 chiefly by browsing of trees 

 and by wading after water plants ; towards which way of livelihood 

 the length of legs and great lip must contribute much. I have read 

 somewhere that it delights in eating the nymph<ea, 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 

 consisted a great deal in the tibia, which was strangely long ; but, 

 in my haste to get out of the stench, I forgot to measure that joint 

 exactly. Its scut seemed to be about an inch long ; the colour was 

 a grizzly black ; the mane about four inches long ; the fore-hoofs 

 were upright and shapely, the hind flat and splayed. The spring 

 before it was only two years old, so that most probably it was not 

 then come to its growth. What a vast tall beast must a full-grown 

 stag be ! I have been told some arrive at ten feet and an half ! 

 This poor creature had at first a female companion of the same 

 species, which died the spring before. In the same garden was a 

 young stag, or red deer, between whom and this moose it was hoped 

 that there might have been a breed ; but their inequality of height 

 must have always been a bar to any commerce of the amorous kind. 

 I should have been glad to have examined the teeth, tongue, lips, 

 hoofs, &c., minutely ; but the putrefaction precluded all farther 

 curiosity. This animal, the keeper told me, seemed to enjoy itself 

 best in the extreme frost of the former winter. In the house they 

 showed me the horn of a male moose, which had no front antlers, 

 but only a broad palm with some snags on the edge. The noble 

 owner of the dead moose proposed to make a skeleton of her bones. 

 Please to let me hear if my female moose corresponds with that 

 you saw ; and whether you think still that the American moose and 

 European elk are the same creature. 1 



I am, with the greatest esteem, &c. 



1 The American moose is not now generally recognised as a distinct species from 

 the European elk. ED. 



