202 FFiANK forester's FIELD SPORTS. 



open, — and the pastern of the Cariboo behig very long and flexi- 

 ble, comes down the whole length on the snow, and gives the 

 animal additional support." 



Now Mr. Wallop is undoubtedly perfectly well acquainted 

 with the general appearance and stature of the Rein-Deer, which, 

 if not elsewhere, he must have seen frequently exhibited in 

 English menageries — I remember a herd of thirty or forty head, 

 shewn at the Egyptian Hall, Piccadilly, not very many years 

 since — and could scarcely fail to distinguish between that animal 

 and the Cariboo, in point of size ; at all events, he knows what 

 an Ox is, and could not compare the track of a beast the size 

 of the American Deer, with that of one so infinitely its superior. 



Hence I judge either that there are in America two distinct 

 varieties of the Rein-Deer — the Arctic animal and the Cari- 

 boo — or that Mr. DeKay has taken his description of the Ame- 

 rican Rein-Deer, or Cariboo, from the European animal, the 

 size and habits of which are much the same as he describes 

 those of our countryman. It may be, however, that the growth 

 of the animal is stunted by the cold of the Arctic regions, and 

 that they are both of one original species. 



Again, the gentleness and gregarious habits of which he 

 speaks, are indeed strikingly characteristic al of the European 

 Rein-Deer of Lapland, Spitzbergen, and the like, — perhaps, 

 also, of the Rein-Deer of the extreme Arctic regions of Ame- 

 rica — but are in no wise common to the Cariboo, which is very 

 rarely found in parties of above four or five, and never — to my 

 knowledge — in herds exceeding twenty. 



It is, moreover, the shyest and wildest by far, as well as the 

 fleetest, inhabitant of the northern forests ; infinitely more so 

 than the Moose, which can invariably he run down, when the 

 snow is deep and crusted, by a strong hunter on snow shoes ; 

 whereas the Cariboo is so difficult of access, and so great is the 

 velocity and continuance of his flight, that when he is once 

 alarmed, and has betaken himself to his heels, it is considered 

 utterly useless to pursue him farther. 



With these few preliminary observations — which I judge ne- 



