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AUTUMN AND WINTER 



wapiti ; and in Asia, South and East Europe, and North 

 Africa, there are numerous races and varieties of red deer 

 which do not deserve the name of separate species. The 

 branching form of the antlers has been moulded by develop- 

 ment among the like patterns of the forest boughs. Now- 

 adays it may seem strange to speak of the red deer as a 

 typical forest beast ; we are more accustomed to see it amid 



the more or less bare moor- 

 land and mountain scenery of a 

 Scotch deer-forest. But it is 

 chiefly confined in Scotland to 

 open country, because no room 

 can be found for large beasts 

 of wandering habits and hearty 

 appetites on the lower, more 

 wooded and more fertile 

 ground. The red deer has 

 been expelled to the lonelier 

 uplands, like the raven among 

 fowl. But there are miles of 

 dense thicket as well as open 

 moor in its haunts on Exmoor ; and the same is true of the 

 New Forest, where a very few red deer still survive. For- 

 merly they inhabited all the great tracts of forest which 

 covered the larger part of England. Their comparatively 

 small size, and the inferior growth of their antlers in Great 

 Britain, also show that the exposed conditions of a typical 

 deer-forest are not the most suitable for them. Fine beast 

 though a well-grown Scotch stag may be, the spread of the 

 best horns ever seen nowadays is far inferior to the finest 

 specimens from south-eastern Europe, and also to those 

 dug up from the peat, and probably dating from two to three 

 thousand years back. The weakening effect of inbreeding 



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HIND OF RED DEER 



