RUMINANT QUADRUPEDS. 351 



fled in their attempts to approach it, sufliciently attest the 

 perfection of its orj^anization in reference to all these ob- 

 jects. The chamois has often been seen to leap down a per- 

 pendicular precipice of twenty or thirty feet in hei<rht, 

 without sustaining the slightest injury. How the ligaments 

 that bind the joints can resist the violent strains and concus- 

 sions they must be exposed to in these quick and jarring 

 efforts, is truly wonderful. 



While Nature has provided these animals with the means 

 of safety from their more formidable enemies, she has not 

 left them altogether without defence against their more equal 

 rivals in the field. It is on the head that she has implanted 

 those powerful arms which are sometimes wielded with dead- 

 ly effect in their mutual combats. Even when not furnished 

 with horns, the animal instinctively strikes with its fore- 

 head where the frontal bone has been expanded and forti- 

 fied apparently with a view to this mode of attack. Thus, 

 the ram butts with its head without reference to the horns, 

 which are coiled so as to be turned away from the object to 

 be struck. In the deer and the ox tribes, however, the horns 

 are formidable weapons of offence: and it will be interest- 

 ing to inquire**into the nature of these- organs, and the phe- 

 nomena of their production. 



The antlers of the male stag are osseous structures, sup- 

 ported on short and solid tubercles of the frontal bone: af- 

 ter remaining nearly a year they are cast off, and soon re- 

 placed by a newly formed antler, which is of larger size than 

 the one which was lost. Previously to the formation of 

 this structure, those branches of the artery, termed the ca- 

 rotid, which supply blood to the frontal bone, are observed 

 very rapidly to dilate, and to throb with unusual force; and 

 all the blood vessels of the skin of the part where the antler 

 is to arise, soon become distended with blood; an effect 

 which is accompanied by general heat and redness, like a 

 part in a state of high inflammation.* Presently the skin is 



* These phenomena are connected with periodical changes in the consti- 

 tution relating to the productive functions. 



