780 The Zoologist — June, 1867. 



The roe is generally described as strictly monogamous, but is not 

 really so; two or more does are not unfrequently seen in the company 

 of a buck at pairing time, and several bucks are often attracted by 

 German sportsmen by an imitation of the doe's bleat, as already 

 observed. Either one or two fawns see the light early in May, and 

 are at first concealed in some dense thicket. They accompany their 

 parents all through the summer, and if it is true that the latter drive 

 them away in the rutting season, they certainly allow them to return 

 afterwards, for I have seen old and young in company as late as the 

 middle of October. 



The first indications of the future horns of the roe-buck are two 

 rounded knobs, covered with the well-known "velvet;" these are 

 succeeded by straight simple points, three or four inches long, and in 

 this state the young roe is termed by the German jiigers " Spiess-bock " 

 (literally, spear-buck). In due course these are succeeded by forked 

 horns, having one point or antler directed forwards nearly at right 

 angles with the " beam " or main stem ; at this season the bearer is a 

 "gabel-bock" (i. e. fork-buck, or forker). Another year sees the full 

 complement of three points, the first or lower being directed forwards, 

 the second or upper backwards : after this no further branches are 

 added, although the horns become more heavy and massive as the 

 amiinal becomes older. But these changes are not always regularly 

 gone through, and although six points, three on each horn, is the full 

 natural complement, heads with seven, eight, and even ten and twelve 

 branches are to be seen in the museums of German y, wheic the 

 collecting of deer's horns is a not uncommon mania. Many of these 

 large and magnificent head-gears belonged to roe-deer shot in the last 

 century. The same thing holds good of the red deer (Cervus elaphus), 

 so much so that some German naturalists assert that a different variety 

 of the stag, wiih larger horns (" Brand thirsch"), was then found in 

 Europe; but the fact that many of the old roe heads are equally 

 wonderful in their development, seems to point to the better feeding 

 and greater age of deer of old days as the cause of their superior 

 beauty and size of horn. 



The mention of fine heads naturally leads us to the wonderful and 

 fantastic antlers which German collectors term " abnormitaten " 

 {deformities) : these likewise would seem to have been more numerous 

 in old days. When in Germany, five years ago, I made drawings of 

 many of these heads, and, by the kindness of Mr. Newman, some of 

 my rough sketches are here reproduced. 



