396 BIG GAME SHOOTING 
the moose (C. ales), the woodland caribou (C. ¢arandus), the 
Barren Ground caribou (C. tarandus arcticus), the mule deer 
(C. macrotis), the Columbian black-tailed deer (C. columbianus), 
the Virginian or white-tailed deer (C. virginianus), and a little- 
known beast called by Caton C. acapulcensis. 
With the last-named a sportsman is likely to have very 
little to do, as its range is extremely limited and its size in- 
significant (‘weight from 30 to 4o lbs., height 24 ins. at the 
shoulder, and length from the end of the nose to the root 
of the tail 44 ins.’; cf. Caton’s ‘ Deer of America,’ pp. 121, 
122), whilst its antlers, though quaint, are hardly worth taking 
as atrophy. Caton gives a cut of the antlers of a full-grown 
buck of this species. Of the originals of that cut Caton says 
that they measure in length 7 ins. and 3 lines, in circum- 
ference above the burr 2 ins. and that they are more 
palmated than the horns of any other American deer except 
moose and caribou. For further information on this deer the 
reader is referred to Caton’s work, which should be in the library 
of every man interested in natural history. Of the other seven 
species of American cervide there is much to be said, and 
little space left to say it in. 
(1) Moose (C. ales) 
Of all deer extant to-day, the moose is the largest. Of all 
earth’s animals, except perhaps old Haploceros, he bears most 
plainly still the impress of Nature’s ’prentice hand when she 
made things huge and roughhewn, and had no time to polish 
her work and smooth off the corners. Evolution does not seem 
to have affected the moose, for to-day he wanders along that 
great chain of lakes from the Arctic to the Atlantic, from the 
mouth of the Mackenzie River to the St. Lawrence—a survival 
of the earth’s dawn rather than a commonplace nineteenth- 
century deer. All sorts of stories are told as to his weight and 
size. Caton, who is always careful not to exaggerate, puts the 
weight of a bull moose at from 700 to 1,400 Ibs., and his height 
at 6 ft. at the withers. The largest pair of horns of which we — 
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