226 BULLETIN 56, UNITED STATES NATIONAL MUSEUM. 



with " velvet " and still perfectly soft, except the horny, loose 

 tips. Several horn sheaths, apparently not very old, were found 

 by members of the survey, west of the Rio Grande, during March, 

 April, and May, 1892; but all of the adult antelope killed, that I 

 examined, had perfect horns. Females lacking horns were extremely 

 rare. ^, 



Weight.— KAviM male No. 63175, U.S.N.M., killed June 3, 1892, at 

 the Playas Valley, near Monument No. 62, weighed 112 pounds, as 

 killed, after bleeding; adult female (No. 1889, author's collection), 

 killed June 15, 1892, in the same locality, contained two fetuses, and 

 weighed 109 pounds as killed, after bleeding. Three adult males 

 (Nos. ffllf, Iflli, and 63176, U.S.N.M.), weighed 64, 56, and 67 

 pounds, respectively, without viscera, head, feet, and skin. 



Habits and local distribution. — The prong horn antelope is already 

 a rare animal in the region of the Southwest, where it ranged in 

 thousands twenty-five years ago. In much of the region covered 

 by my field notes of the eighties no antelope can be found at the 

 present day. The antelope was not uncommon from the Rio Grande 

 to the Animas Valley during the operations of the International 

 Boundary Commission, and antelope and deer were largely depended 

 upon for a supply of fresh meat. A trooper of the Second Cavdlry 

 named Swartz, who was an excellent hunter, turned in more than 

 80 antelopes to the general mess from May to July, 1892. I have 

 recently been informed that it would now be dif&cult to see that 

 number in the whole region. In view of the present scarcity of this 

 beautiful ungulate, I will give in detail such notes as are contained 

 in my notebooks of years ago, beginning in 1884, Avhen great herds 

 of them could be seen in crossing the Territories of New Mexico and 

 Arizona by rail. Herds were frequent between Ash Fork and 

 AVhipple, along the stage route in March, 1884. At that time thou- 

 sands of them were killed annually around the San Francisco and Bill 

 Williams mountains, but none remained in the immediate vicinity of 

 Fort Verde, my first army station. About that time hunters began to 

 comment upon its rapidly decreasing numbers throughout the region, 

 and by the year 1888, it had become comparatively uncommon except 

 in restricted areas still unoccupied by the whites. 



On the northern plains the vast majority of antelope were sup- 

 posed to pass their entire lives in the open country away from forests, 

 but in Arizona and New Mexico the mountains were occupied during 

 the summer and the lower mesas and valleys in winter. In 1887, I 

 found newly born young during the first half of June on two sides 

 of the San Francisco Mountain, close to 'the upper limit of Pinus 

 ponderosa, above 2,424 meters (8,000 feet). It was also breeding 

 through the pine zone of the Mogollon mesa and Great San Fran- 



