WAPITI DEEK 67 



all that the ancestors of the American hison came originally 

 from Asia. The exact geological period of this supposed 

 Asiatic invasion will be discussed in the next chapter, when 1 we 

 come to deal with Alaska. Some other extinct bisons are 

 known from America besides those alluded to. Bison crassi- 

 cornis, according to Dr. Lucas, is confined to Alaska. Mr. 

 Lydekker, * on the other hand, considers it identical with 

 Bison priscus, an extinct bison which ranged throughout 

 arctic Siberia and a large part of Europe. 



South of the belt of stunted timber lie the vast forests 

 of the Athabaska and Peace Kiver valleys, and a great zone 

 of warmer country abounding in animal life, as we proceed 

 in the same direction. A noble representative of the deer 

 tribe which we meet here reminds us of the European red 

 deer. In the States it is commonly known as the elk (Cervus 

 canadensis), though it has no connection with the moose, 

 which in Europe is known by that name. In Canada it is 

 more generally called " wapiti deer." While the range of 

 the moose seems to be on the increase in the Mackenzie 

 Eegion, it is curious that the wapiti has become almost extinct 

 in the northern parts of its former geographical range, and 

 now only occurs there in small numbers. 



Mr. Thompson Seton f tells us that originally, that is to 

 say about the beginning of the sixteenth century, the wapiti 

 was found from the Mackenzie Eegion as far east as Boston, 

 and as far south as Arizona and Alabama (see Fig. 6). Its 

 destruction proceeded unchecked until the year 1895, when a 

 change in public opinion took place. Henceforth the wapiti 

 was protected; and it is now actually on the increase in 

 Manitoba and along the Kocky Mountains from Alberta to 

 the borders of New Mexico and also along the Pacific States. 



The wapiti has only been observed in a fossil state in 

 Pleistocene deposits. We know from these records that its 

 range extended in Pleistocene times southward as far as 

 Florida and from North Carolina to New Jersey and Kentucky. 



The resemblance between the American wapiti and, at any 



* Lydekker, E., " Catalogue of Fossil Mammalia," II., p. 24. 

 t Seton, Ernest Thompson, " Life Histories of Northern Animals," I , 

 p. 43. 



F2 



