88 HOOFED ANIMALS 



all hoofed animals. It is not only at home on the vast arctic 

 waste above Great Slave Lake, known as the Barren Grounds, 

 but it ranges on northeastward through Ellesmere Land, 

 crosses to the west coast of Greenland, swings around the 

 northern rim of that island, along the edge of the great ice 

 cap, and down the eastern coast, at least as far as Liverpool 

 Bay, Latitude 70°. Doubtless it inhabits the whole coast of 

 Greenland, wherever the naked ridges and valleys of the 

 terminal moraines yield a supply of food: but there is no 

 evidence that it wanders over the vast sheet of lifeless inland 

 ice which covers the interior of Greenland. 



A Caribou is at all times an odd-looking creature. Even a 

 very brief inspection is sufficient to reveal the special provi- 

 sions which Nature has made to enable it to brave the terrors 

 of an arctic climate. The legs are thick and strong, and the 

 hoof is expanded and flattened until it forms a very good 

 snow-shoe. The Caribou walks over snow-fields and quak- 

 ing muskegs, when the moose sinks in and ploughs through 

 them. 



Its pelage consists of a thick, closely matted coat of fine, 

 wool-like hair, through which grows the coarse hair of the rain- 

 coat. It is the warmest covering to be found on any hoofed 

 animal except the musk-ox, or on any animal of the Deer 

 Family. To the touch the new coat of a Caribou feels like 

 a thick felt mat. 



The natural food of the Caribou is moss and lichens, and 

 in captivity very few survive many months without the 

 former. The supply of moss for the Caribou and reindeer 

 once kept in the New York Zoological Park came from Maine 



