Nov. 24, 1881] 
NATURE 
85 
recently, in 1878, similar specimens (Procervulus) have 
been described by Prof. Gaudry (“Les Enchainements,” 
p- 87) from the Mid-Meiocene strata of Thenay in the 
valley of the Loire. In all these cases the bony pro- 
longation of the frontals—for antler it can hardly be 
termed—is small, erect, and variously branched, is per- 
sistent through life, and probably, as Prof. Cope suggests, 
Fic. 1.—Cervus Matheroni, Gerv., Upper Meiocene, Mont Léberon (4) Fic. 2.—C. ferrievz, Cr. and Job., Upper Pleiocene, Mont Perrier (3). 
C. tssiodorensis, Cr. and Job., Upper Pleiocene, Mont Perrier (}). 
was covered, as in the giraffe, and on young growing 
antlers, with skin. 
In some, however, of Prof. Cope’s specimens a well- 
marked burr is to be seen on some of the tynes (The 
United States Geogr. Survey, Part II. vol. iv. Paleeonto- 
logy, Pl. Ixxx., 34, 4a), due perhaps to an accidental strip- 
ping of the velvet, and consequent inflammation, resulting 
Fic. 3.— 
Fic. 4.—C, etuertarunt, Cr. and Job., Upper Pleiocene, Mont Perrier (4). 
Fic, 5.—C. pardinensis, Cr. and Job., Upper Pleiocene, Mont Perrier (}). 
in the death of the bony tissue above it. We may there- 
fore conclude that this singular Pyocervulus type was the 
starting-point of the antlered Ruminants both in the Old 
and the New Worlds. In both, moreover, it is associated 
with the Dicroceros type. The two phases of antler de- 
velopment in the Mid-Meiocene age in Europe, and pro- 
bably at the same age in North America, are represented 
by living deer, first by the transient condition of the 
Fic. 6.—C. dicranios, Nest, Val d’ Arno (;},). 
young antler in the velvet, and secondly by the second 
antler in most species, and by the simple-forked upright 
antler of the adult muntjac. 
The antlers also of the adult fallow deer (C. dama) present 
variations which can, in my opinion, only be accounted for 
by the doctrine of evolution. The ancestral form appears 
in the Pleistocene age in Britain, and is characterised by 
| antlers palmated in front, instead of behind the beam, as 
in the normal living species, from which I defined it under 
the name of C. Browz, after its discoverer at Clacton in 
Essex. It occurs also in the gravels of the Thames 
Valley at Acton. Sir Victor Brooke has pointed out that 
some three or four specimens out of the vast number of 
antlers of the living form which he has examined possess: 
