1902. J OP HORNS AND ANTLERS. . 207 



" Horns"), an arrangement which we find adopted by Leche {pp. cit. 

 p. 980) :— 



Os coniu absent — Integument unaltered the unpaired boss of the Giraffe. 



rintegument unaltered, os cornu persisting. . .paired horns of Giraffe. 



Integument thin, short-haired, os cornu cadue ^ Antler sensu 



Os cornu presents strictiori — Subuli. 



\ r J. i. •£ J ( horn-sheath shed — Antilocapra. 



j^Integument cornified | ^^ persisting-BovidEe. 



Leaving aside the erroneous statement that the median "horn" 

 of the Giraffe possesses no separate bone-core or os cornu, but 

 only a fi'ontal boss, this ariangement looks much better than 

 what it is intended to convey. In fact it represents exactly the 

 phyletic stages which I shall endeavour to prove as correct. But 

 Brandt says exphcitly that the antler represents a higher, physio- 

 logically more complicated, differentiated stage of the bovine 

 armament. In this i-espect he agi-ees with Rutimeyer, who con- 

 sidered the Cervidse as the "unfertigste vmd neueste" of all 

 Ruminants. Moreover, Brandt suggests the following evolutionary 

 stages: Fu^st, epidermal horns (analogous to those of Rhino- 

 ceros) ; secondly, the acquisition of frontal pedicles ; thirdly, an 

 OS cornu and an antler. Lastly, the same author doubts the 

 correctness of Riitimeyei''s reasonable view that the Antilocaprine 

 armaments are intermediate between those of Bovina3 and 

 Cervinse. 



Gegenbaur (1898), ignoring the os cornu altogether (op. cit, 

 p. 106-107), misses the proper connexion which exists between 

 horns and antlers. His remarks are not so precise and lucid as 

 they might be, and there is not a word about the most sug- 

 gestive preformation in a partly cartilaginous matrix. 



Nitsche (1898) has tried to give a coherent account of the 

 whole question, but he does not seem to have made any other 

 than macroscopic examinations. Starting with well-ascertained 

 instances, observed in the Stag and Roe, where lesion of the side 

 of an otherwise normal pedicle has caused the growth of extra 

 antlers, he concludes that these cannot be anything but out- 

 growths or exostoses of the frontal bone. Consequently, he 

 argues, such extra antlers cannot be homologous with normal 

 antlers if such are dermal bones ; i. e., according to his unfor- 

 tunate definition, bones which are developed within the skin alone 

 and without connexion with the skeleton. He then refers to the 

 mode of growth of the first knobs and prickets of the young Roe, 

 that thei'e is no difference in structure and development between 

 pedicle and pricket, anyhow that both are one and the same apo- 

 physis, while the separate existence of the os cornu in the Bovidse 

 shows that their bone-core is an epiphysis. He then logically 

 opposes the two organs to each other. Moreover, he looks upon 

 the armaments of the Giraffe as exquisite types of cutis-ossification, 

 in fact, as examples of free dermal bones, since they develop 



1 Obviously a misprint of Brandt and Leche for caducum. 



