THE ANTLERS. 185 
From him I learned that the male reindeer only are used for 
draft or burden. These are usually castrated when three years 
old. This is not done by amputation as with us, but by bruising 
and crushing the testicle with the teeth, without opening the 
scrotum and removing the member. This of necessity is but 
very imperfect castration, and while it may destroy the capacity 
for generation, it does not entirely remove desire, and moderates 
without destroying the spirits of the animal. Were the opera- 
tion complete, it might leave the animal so dull and stupid as to 
impair, if it did not destroy, his usefulness. 
It had never occurred to the Lapp, that this operation had any 
influence on the growth of the antlers, but he supposed they were 
cast off and renewed on the mutilated as on the perfect animal. 
On reflection, however, he remembered that many carried the 
velvet longer than usual, and that in a few instances the deer 
had carried their antlers through the winter, and it might be 
that the antlers were broken off near the head instead of being 
detached at the articulation as on the perfect animal. 
My conclusion was, from all the information I could gather, 
that complete castration of the reindeer has the same effect on 
the growth of their antlers as on other deer, but that in Lapland 
the operation is usually very imperfect, and so the effect is less, 
and sometimes is so little, that the antler still matures, and is 
regularly cast off every year, while on others the operation is 
more complete, when the antler never matures, but is broken off 
near the head when it becomes frozen through, and from the 
stump a new antler grows the following year, as we shall pres- 
ently see is the case with other deer. 
It is not remarkable that facts like these should be quite over- 
looked by the Lapps, for to them they have no interest; and the 
obliging Lapp was uo doubt much surprised that I should come 
so far to make inquiries about matters which to him were so ut- 
terly unimportant, for he could not see how they could help to 
fill the pot. 
But even naturalists, if they have not entirely overlooked the 
subject, have not deemed it of sufficient importance to institute 
careful experiments so as to arrive at correct conclusions. While 
most writers on the Cervide have alluded to the subject, they 
have generally despatched it in a paragraph or two, in which 
they have given vague rumors, or adopted loose statements from 
careless observers, and so as might be expected they have arrived 
at contradictory or very unsatisfactory conclusions. 
