HABIT AND DOMESTICATION. 



295 



tiously venture to take corn from my hand, a familiarity never 

 indulged in by a Virginia deer raised by its mother. Ever after 

 they were almost as tame as the Virginia deer raised by hand, 

 ever ready to come to vcij call and take food from my hand when 

 offered, and follow me all over the grounds, being sure of getting 

 something to encourage them, — still they would never allow me 

 to handle them, as their dam or sire did who were raised by 

 hand, evidently thinking it a great condescension if they al- 

 lowed me to rub their faces a little. How much I am indebted 

 for this familiarity to the short confinement when they were very 

 young, it is impossible to say, but I think not very much, for they 

 seemed as wild immediately after they were let out as Virginia 

 fawns of the same age, and so continued till in the fall, when they 

 followed their mother up and began to get feed. The Virginia 

 fawns tliat follow up in the same way soon learn what shelled 

 corn is, and in the course of the winter become so emboldened as 

 to pick it up within ten feet of the keeper, who feeds them 

 every day. All the deer, as well as the flock of wild turkeys, 

 the sand-hill cranes, and the wild geese, and Southdown sheep in 

 my grounds, soon learn what the rattling of the corn-sheller 

 means, and it is one of the pleasantest sights I have among my 

 pets, to see all start at this sound and make a rush for the feed- 

 ing grounds where all eat together pretty harmoniously, the 

 wildest of each always showing a little suspicion and keeping 

 well on the outer borders. 



THE BLACK-TAILED DEEK. 



The male of the Columbia Black-tailed Deer is only less wicked 

 than I have reason to believe the fully adult mule deer, when 

 he has been raised by hand. How he would behave if raised by 

 his dam in the park I cannot say. I have never observed any 

 vicious manifestations by the adult does, as is the case with the 

 mule does. 



The first of C. Columhianus which I ever had I procured on 

 the Cowlitz River in Washington Territory, in 1870. The male 

 was then one year old and the female two years old. They stood 

 the journey of three thousand miles by sea and land well, and 

 arrived in fine condition. Both had been brought up by hand, 

 but the doe had never been subjected to the halter, and for a 

 time gave me some trouble in transferring her from one convey- 

 ance to another, but by the time she got througii she was well 

 halter- broken. 



