THE ZOOLOGIST. 



THIRD SERIES. 



Vol. VI.] MAECH, 1882. [No. 63 



NOTES ON IRISH RED DEER. 

 By Richard J. Ussher. 



Dr. Charles Smith, in his ' Ancient and Present State of 

 the County and City of Waterford,' published in 1774, remarks 

 (p. 343) : — " In the mountains of Knockmealdown we have some 

 remains of the Eed-deer, but so few that it is to be feared the 

 species will in a few years be extinct, especially if a little more 

 care be not taken of them." This lofty range, which culminates 

 at a height of 2609 feet, occupies a large area between the 

 counties of Waterford and Tipperary, and its great unenclosed 

 tracts of moor, interspersed formerly with oak woods, were the 

 natural home of the wild native Deer, though they would have 

 been quite unsuitable for the preservation of an introduced breed 

 in those lawless times, when, moreover, these mountains were 

 divided between different estates whose owners were not in 

 harmony. 



In that same year a disputed question of boundary on these 

 very mountains gave rise to a suit between the Duke of Devon- 

 shire and Lord Cahir, and the evidence of some of the witnesses 

 in this suit, examined in 1775, is interesting as confirming the 

 alleged existence of Eed-deer on these mountains at that date. 

 From the papers in this suit, preserved at Lismore Castle, 

 Mr. Francis E. Currey, for many years the agent of the Duke of 

 Devonshire in this part of Ireland, has kindly furnished me with 

 the following extracts : — 



"John Power, of Kilbeg, aged eighty, says that in the time of Richard 

 late Earl of Burlington [who died in 1753] the right of Thomas Lord Cahir 



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