THE ALCINE DEER OF THE OLD AND NEW WORLDS. 59 



greater civilisation in the western portion of the Eussian 

 empire, it recedes towards the sixtieth. 



In the New World, it would appear from old narra- 

 tives that the moose (as we must unfortunately continue 

 to call the elk, whose proper title has been misappro- 

 priated to Cervus canadensis) once extended as far south 

 as the Ohio. Later accounts represent its southern limit 

 on the Atlantic coast to be the Bay of Fundy^ the coun- 

 tries bordering which — Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, 

 and the State of Maine — appear to be the most favourite 

 abode of the moose ; for nowhere in the northern and 

 western extension of the North American forest do we 

 find this animal so numerous as in these districts. Absent 

 from the islands of Prince Edward, Anticosti, and New- 

 foundland, it is found on the Atlantic sea-board, and to 

 the north of New Brunswick, in the province of Gaspe ; 

 across the St. Lawrence, not further to the eastward 

 than the Saguenay, though it was met with formerly on 

 the Labrador as far as the river Godbout. The absence 

 of the moose in Newfoundland appears unaccountable ; 

 for, although a large portion of this great island is com- 

 posed of open moss-covered plateaux and broad savannahs 

 — favourite resorts of the cariboo or American reindeer — 

 yet it contains tracts of forest, principally coniferous, 

 of considerable extent, in which birch, willow, and 

 swamp-maple are sufficiently abundant to afford an 

 ample subsistence to the former animal, which is stated 

 by Sir J. Kichardson to ascend the rivers in the north- 

 west of America nearly to the Arctic Circle — as far, in 

 fact, as the willows grow on the banks. 



Assuming that the moose is still found in New Hamp- 

 shire and Vermont, where it exists, according to Audubon 



