324 



BRITISH MAMMALS 



rather than rounds round ears being characteristic of the lower 

 and 'more pig-like types of deer. 



Stags, and sometimes hinds, have small tusks or canine 

 teeth in the upper jaw, as well as, of course, the invariable 

 incisor-like canine in the lower jaw. Stags, but especially 

 hinds, are not disinclined to use their teeth for purposes of 

 oiFence, and hinds can give a very severe bite with their 

 lower front teeth. The hoofs of the front toes are long and 

 well developed, as are also the " false " hoofs of the side 



toes. As already mentioned, 

 red deer fight with their feet 

 (especially the front feet) 

 almost as much as with their 

 horns. They possess the usual 

 metatarsal gland and tuft on 

 the outer side of the hind 

 legs, and the face gland, or 

 tear pit, which characterises so 

 many of the deer and some 

 of the antelopes. 



The antlers of the red 

 deer rise somewhat slantingly 

 and divergently from their 

 bases on top of the skull, 

 above and a little behind the 

 orbits of the eyes. The pedicle of bone from which they grow 

 is quite short, not more than from i in. to 2 in. in length, 

 though of considerable diameter. As in most of the highly 

 specialised deer, this pedicle tends to become shorter and shorter, 

 though, as we have already seen in our review of horns and 

 antlers, the pedicle was at one time the " horn," and remains 

 such in the Bovine ruminants, among which it has grown to 

 tremendous lengths, adding to itself an outer covering of horn. 

 The great burr, or folding of bone, which marks the place out- 

 wardly where the antler joins the pedicle, is called the " coronet." 

 Just above the coronet on the under side of the antler starts the 



.Gland tuft below 

 deer's hock. 



Gland Tuft on Hind Leg of Red Deer 



