HIPPOPOTAMUSES, PIGS, AND DEER 323 



The colour of the red deer's horns varies a good deal in 

 individuals and according to season. Generally in July and 

 August, when the " velvet " has just been stripped ofF, the horns 

 are a whitish-yellow, with a dark brown colour in the crevices ; 

 but as they grow older they tend to become dark umber- 

 brown, with light tips to the prongs, these tips of bone becoming 

 almost white in some instances. The " velvet," or thin skin 

 covered with woolly hair, which clothes the young antlers, is a 

 grayish-brown in colour. The horns are generally shed in 

 February and March, and begin to grow again in April. They 

 are complete in growth in July, and in August the " velvet " 

 begins to peel oiF. The horns are scarcely free from these very 

 unsightly strips of dead skin till the end of August or the 

 beginning of September. In the author's painting of " Red 

 Deer on the Heather " (month of August) he has shown the 

 antlers still hung with these strips of whitish skin. 



The neck of the red deer is long, often markedly so in the 

 hind. Red deer are particularly broad across the forehead from 

 eye to eye, and, seen from the front, the heavy wrinkled brows 

 of the broad forehead so much overhang the eye that but little 

 of that organ is visible. This, the observer will note, is very 

 different from the appearance of the roebuck and of other primitive 

 forms of deer, in which the eyes are more pig-like in position 

 and somewhat nearer together. The shape of the red deer's 

 head is not quite of the ideal beauty always represented by Land- 

 seer, who gives it a straight, or concave, nose profile — not too 

 long — with dilated nostrils and enormous eyes. The hind some- 

 times has quite an ugly head, with a long nose, and rather a 

 dog-like muzzle. The " pretty " type of Landseer hind might 

 be explained by the theory that he had only drawn young hinds ; 

 but in the young hind the nostrils would not be so large and 

 prominent as in Landseer's deer. In the young hind the muzzle 

 is more pointed, and the nose is shorter than in the older 

 animal. The stag may even exhibit quite a Roman, or arched, 

 nose, but as a general rule he has a more beautifully shaped 

 head than his mate. The ears are rather long, and are pointed 



