HABIT. 45 



ing, or accidentally comes upon one of bis rivals, both parties !'un 

 at each other with their heads lowered and their eyes flashing 

 angrily, and while they strike with their horns they wheel and 

 bound with prodigious activity and rapidity, giving and receiv- 

 ing severe wounds, sometimes, like fencers, getting within each 

 other's ' points,' and each hooking his antagonist with the re- 

 curved branches of his horns, which bend considerably inward 

 and downward." 



For myself, I have never seen them in battle, nor have I seen 

 any one who had seen them fight under such circumstances as 

 enabled him to give me a clear idea of their mode of battle, so 

 we may take the description quoted as accurate. In this connec- 

 tion, and for the purpose of comparing this habit of our animal 

 with the African antelope, I maj^ refer to what Sparrman, who, 

 more than a century ago studied the various species of that 

 animal in his native range, says : " The last mentioned antelope 

 (^Antilope oryx)., according to the accounts given me by several 

 persons at the Cape, falls upon its knees when it goes to butt any 

 one." ^ He ascribes the same habit to the gnu. Although this 

 is the only author I find who speaks of the mode of fighting of 

 the true antelope, it is quite probable that this is a generic char- 

 acteristic, and if so, it shows how widely they differ in this re- 

 gard from our animal. 



The rutting season occurs when the horn on the fully adult 

 has about perfected its growth, and before it has been loosened 

 by the new growth, and so is best adapted as a weapon. As its 

 growth is not completed until July or August, and it is cast off 

 in October or November, on the old specimens, and is loosened 

 some time before it drops off, we see that the fighting season 

 must be limited to the rutting season. Indeed, I have a mounted 

 specimen which was killed in the latter part of July, from which 

 I had no difficulty in removing the horn, for the purpose of ex- 

 amining the core and the cavity of the horn. I confess to a lack 

 of that information on the subject which will enable me to say 

 how long the horn continues a perfect weapon, and as that must 

 measure the time during which the males are inclined to wage 

 war on each other, I cannot say how long that continues ; but, as 

 the principal cause of hostility must be rivahy in love, it may be 

 safe to assume that it is limited to the rutting season. 



Dr. Canfield, speaking of a domesticated American Antelope 

 which he had in his grounds, says, " He was the most salacious 



1 Sparrman's Voi/ages, vol. ii., p. 132, also Ibid., p. 222. 



