403 Dr. P. L. Sclater on the Systematic Position 



tant discovery regarding this animal, that had been made in the 

 Zoological Society^s Gardens in the Regent's Park during the 

 past year, and had formed the subject of a paper read by Mr. 

 Bartlett, the Superintendent of the Gardens, at one of the So- 

 ciety's meetings in 1865*. This discovery was, that the horns 

 of the Pronghorn were naturally shed every year — a phenomenon 

 hitherto quite unknown among the Bovidse or hollow-horned 

 Ruminants, with which the Pronghorn had always hitherto been 

 associated, and only occurring in the allied Deer-family or Cer- 

 vidse. Mr. Bartlett's observations had been made upon a young 

 male of this scarce mammal, which had been acquired for the 

 Society in January 1865 f, and had since lived in good health 

 in the Menagerie. This animal had shed both its horns on the 

 7th of November, 1865; and a finer pair had since grown, which 

 would, no doubt, be shed in like manner in Nov. 1866. Since 

 Mr. Bartlett's publication of this novel fact, full confirmation of 

 it had been received by the Zoological Society, in a communica- 

 tion from their Corresponding Member, Dr. Colbert A. Canfield, 

 of Monterey, California, who had come to the same conclusion 

 as Mr. Bartlett, from observations on this animal in a state of 

 nature made in the county of Monterey, in some parts of which 

 the Pronghorn was very common J. 



The author exhibited a skull of the Pronghorn with the horns 

 fully developed and ready to be cast off shortly, and explained 

 the mode in which he supposed the shedding to be effected. 

 After the old horn was cast ofi", the horny matter, which was 

 at first entirely confined to the upper end of the new horn, 

 gradually spread itself down to its base, enveloping the nu- 

 merous hairs with which the new horn was clothed when first 

 appearing, and ultimately checking their growth and destroying 

 their vitality. After the horn was perfected and hardened, 

 new hairs developed themselves beneath the epidermis, and, 

 not being able to force their way through tbe horny co- 

 vering, became, as the author believed, the chief agent in 

 causing the shedding of the horn. As regards the general 

 structure of the horns of the Pronghorn, it was quite evident 

 that they had little or nothing in common with those of the 

 Deer. The latter were formed of bone developed upon a 

 process of the frontal bone, and were more correctly termed 

 antlers, whereas the horn of the Pronghorn consisted of true 

 horn (like those of the ordinary Bovidse) gradually developed 



* " Remarks upon the Affinities of the Prongbuck," by A. D. Bartlett, 

 Superintendent of the Society's Gardens. (Proc. Zool. Soc. 1865, p. 718.) 



t See notice and figure, Proc. Zool. Soc. 1865, p. 60, pi. 3. 



X See Dr. Canfield's paper " On the Habits of the Prongbuck, and the 

 periodical shedding of its horns," Proc. Zool. Soc. 1866, p. 105. 



