MEGACEROS H1BERNICUS. 455 



rangement of the extensive and diversified species of the 

 great Linnsean genus Cervus, to regard the subject of the 

 present section as the type of a distinct subgenus, for 

 which the term Megaceros, originally applied by Dr. Hart 

 as the ' nomen triviale' of the extinct species, may be 

 retained, as indicative of the most striking and charac- 

 teristic feature of the antlers, viz., their great proportional 

 size. 



The weight of the skull and antlers of the Megaceros in 

 the Museum of the College of Surgeons in London, is 

 seventy-six pounds avoirdupoise : that of the skull and 

 antlers of the specimen in the Royal Dublin Society is 

 eighty-seven pounds, avoirdupoise. The average weight of 

 the skull, without the horns or lower jaw, is five pounds 

 and a quarter. From the identity of texture of these 

 enormous cranial weapons with those of the Deer-tribe, and 

 from the development of the burr at the base, we may 

 infer that the large bloodvessels, shown by their impres- 

 sions to have been spread so richly over the surface of the 

 antlers during the period of growth, were ultimately oblite- 

 rated, and that the antler, then losing its vitality, was un- 

 dermined by the absorbent process, and cast off. Such 

 shed antlers, showing the characteristic convex surface of 

 the detached base beneath the burr, have been frequently 

 found in Ireland. Dr. Hart has noticed them in his tract 

 above cited, and the base of one in the British Museum is 

 figured in cut 194. It cannot be doubted but that the 

 growth and shedding of the antlers of the Megaceros, 

 obeyed the same periodical law as do those of all existing 

 deer : but, when we reflect that between sixty and seventy 

 pounds' weight of osseous matter was annually thrown out 

 by the carotids in the course of three or four months, we 

 may well exclaim, with Redi, " Maxima profectb admira- 



