442 WILD ANIMALS. 



happen that the swamp is too soft even to admit of this, it adopts 

 the same plan as the mountain ponies do under similar emer- 

 gencies. It throws itself over on one side, draws its feet together, 

 and kicks them out simultaneously with great violence, and thus 

 manages to jerk itself along. In this way it is enabled to cross 

 places where even the wolf gets completely nonplussed. But on 

 the smooth ice it is perfectly helpless. No cat on walnut-shells 

 or donkey on stilts ever looked half so ridiculous as does an elk on 

 the ice. It falls down directly it begins to move, and owing to 

 its length of leg is unable to rise again." 



" The skin is convertible to many purposes, and is very valu- 

 able. Mr. Grieff says : ' It is not long since that a regiment was 

 clothed with buff waistcoats made from the hides of those animals, 

 which were so thick that a ball could scarcely penetrate them.' 

 He adds further, that ' when made into breeches, a pair of them, 

 among the peasantry of former days, went as a legacy for several 

 generations.' " 



The elk was well known to the Eomans. Caesar makes the 

 first allusion to the animal in the pages of history, in the sixth 

 book "De Bello GaUico," wherein he describes it as being an 

 inhabitant of the great Hercynian forests of ancient Germany. 

 Pausanius also refers to it. Pliny, whilst declaring it to be a 

 native of Scandinavia, states that it had not been, during his time, 

 exhibited at the Roman games. At a later period, however, it 

 made its appearance, for Gordian's collection included ten speci- 

 mens, and according to the Latin biographer, Julius Capitolinus, 

 who wrote about the end of the third century, Aurelian, when he 

 celebrated his triumph over Zenobia, exhibited the rare spectacle 

 of the elk, together with the tiger and giraffe. 



Good representatives of the moose are rarely seen in England. 

 The animals that appear occasionally in the Zoological Gardens 

 are generally miserable-looking creatures compared to the animals 

 to be seen wild in America. The climate evidently does not 

 agree with them, and they suffer through the absence of their 

 natural food. King Charles I., who among his other attainments 

 was well versed in natural history, took great interest in all 

 animals, and liked to possess rare specimens, gave directions, in 



