UNGULATA. 365 



became comparatively insignificant, a complexity was reached 

 equalling that observed in the antlers of the majority of the 

 Pleistocene and existing forms. It is thus interesting to note 

 that the gradual acquisition of complex antlers by the race 

 since Miocene times, is parallel with the gradual development 

 of these weapons in an individual modern deer. The animal 

 is born hornless; at the end of the first year it acquires a 

 simple antler (or pricket) ; this is shed, and at the end of the 

 second year a bifurcated antler is acquired ; next year the 

 antlers have two or three tynes ; and so on, until the maximum 

 complexity of the species has been reached. In all existing 

 genera and species except the reindeer (Rangifer tarandus) 

 the antlers are confined to the male sex. 



With reference to the teeth, it is to be noted that the 

 earliest genera of Cervidse are remarkably brachyodont, and 

 their true molars exhibit no complication of the crown beyond 

 the four crescentic cusps. On the other hand, in the majority 

 of the later and more specialized genera the dentition is almost 

 or quite hypsodont, and an insignificant tubercle observed in 

 the molars of the earlier forms on the inner side in the upper 

 jaw, on the outer side in the lower jaw, often becomes 

 afterwards deepened into a slender column. 



The primitive hornless deer of the Lower Miocene are 

 kpown only from western Europe, and their equally unarmed 

 surviving relatives, the musk-deer (Moschus) and the Chinese 

 water-deer (Hydropotes), are now confined to Asia. Amphi- 

 tragulus is known by nearly all parts of the skeleton (hitherto 

 only found isolated and hypothetically placed together) from 

 the Lower Miocene of France and Germany. Its hornless skull 

 is destitute of an antorbital fossa and vacuity, while its 

 dentition is of the characteristic primitive type already 

 mentioned, but with the upper canine elongated. The largest 

 species would probably not exceed a modern roe-deer in size. 

 Dicroceros, known not only by detached bones and teeth, but 

 also by at least one complete skeleton (from Steinheim, Wiir- 

 temberg), is the earliest deer in which antlers have hitherto 

 been observed. These appendages (fig. 207 A) are small, fixed 

 on long bony pedicles, and they simply bifurcate from the base, 



