350 HOOFED ANIMALS 



Deer of Epping Forest are not spotted, and, singularly 

 enough, the fawns are of the same dark brown colour as 

 their parents. 



A special feature of the antlers is the manner in which 

 the upper portions flatten or palmate i.e., they take on the 

 shape of a hand (Lat., palma, a palm). Twenty to twenty- 

 seven inches is a good length of antler, and there is no 

 record of one as long as thirty inches. The male up to its 

 sixth year takes a fresh name each season with the annual 

 change in its spreading crest. A fawn is antlerless. The 

 ' Pricket ' possesses simple snags, to which the ' Sorrel ' adds 

 two front branches a year later. In the next season the 

 increasing antler shows a slight amount of palmation, 

 the animal becoming a ' Buck of the first lead ' in its fifth 

 year, and a Buck complete in its sixth. A well-grown 

 animal will turn the scale at two hundred pounds. 



The Fallow Deer has to be supplied with hay and corn 

 in winter, owing to living in enclosed tracts where its 

 natural food is limited and soon exhausted. It is par- 

 ticularly fond of horse-chestnuts, for which reason this 

 tree is largely planted in deer parks. 



On February 8, 1899, a pack of hounds chased a Red 

 Hind into Pixton Park, where they ran it down and killed. 

 The dogs then fell upon a herd of tame Fallow Deer, of 

 which they killed seventeen before the huntsmen could 

 come up to stop the slaughter. 



The extinct Irish Elk is supposed to have been only a 

 species of the common Fallow Deer. In County Water- 

 ford has been dug up a pair of antlers, the right one of 

 which measured six feet on the inside, while the left one 

 was four inches shorter. From tip to tip the spread just 

 exceeded nine feet. The chase of an animal so immense 

 must have furnished rare excitement, when one re- 

 members the clumsy weapons with which primitive man 

 was provided. The Irish Elk roamed over Great Britain 

 as well as over a great portion of the Continent. 



The Fallow Deer of Mesopotamia is not only a larger 

 animal, but is more brightly coloured, and there is less 

 palmation of the antlers, which are more vertical and 

 spreading. 



