1 70 The Wilderness Hunter. 



blacktail. In two or three instances, I have seen elk show 

 silly ignorance of danger ; but half a dozen times I have 

 known blacktail behave with an even greater degree of 

 stupid familiarity. 



There is another point in which the wapiti and black- 

 tail agree in contrast to the moose and whitetail. Both 

 the latter delight in water-lilies, entering the ponds to find 

 them, and feeding on them greedily. The wapiti is very 

 fond of wallowing in the mud, and of bathing in pools 

 and lakes ; but as a rule it shows as little fondness as 

 the blacktail for feeding on water-lilies or other aquatic 

 plants. 



In reading of the European red deer, which is nothing 

 but a diminutive wapiti, we often see a " stag of ten " 

 alluded to as if a full-grown monarch. A full-grown wapiti 

 bull, however, always has twelve, and may have fourteen, 

 regular normal points on his antlers, besides irregular ad- 

 ditional prongs ; and he occasionally has ten points when 

 a two-year-old, as I have myself seen with calves captured 

 young and tamed. The calf has no horns. The yearling 

 carries two foot-long spikes, sometimes bifurcated, so as to 

 make four points. The two-year-old often has six or 

 eight points on his antlers ; but sometimes ten, although 

 they are always small. The three-year-old has eight or ten 

 points, while his body may be nearly as large as that of a 

 full-grown animal. The four-year-old is normally a ten or 

 twelve pointer, but as yet with much smaller antlers than 

 those so proudly borne by the old bulls. 



Frontiersmen only occasionally distinguish the prongs 

 by name. The brow and bay points are called dog-killers 



