246 THE ZOOLOGIST. 



usually master stags, and sometimes acknowledged monarchs of 

 large herds. In other words, a Deer fighting for a harem with 

 the bare forehead of his Miocene ancestors achieves success, 

 sustained and repeated, against rivals armed with complex and 

 deadly weapons, laboriously fashioned by countless ages of 

 sexual selection towards the very purpose for which they are 

 now proved useless. 



The theory of sexual selection must therefore be set aside as 

 a scientific account of the origin and purpose of the frontal 

 weapons of ruminants. It does not explain their structure as an 

 adaptation to the assumed purpose, nor does it explain their 

 presence in both sexes as a result of the assumed origin, while it 

 is in absolute conflict with established facts relative to sexual 

 combat between armed and unarmed individuals of a species. 



But the success of the bald stag in sexual warfare, which 

 forbids our finding in the discarded hypothesis a vera causa for 

 the derivation of frontal weapons, unmistakably indicates in what 

 direction we must look for a true key to the puzzle. Everyone 

 who has hunted wild Deer with hounds, whether slow or swift, 

 knows that an unarmed stag would instantly be torn to pieces 

 where a well-equipped Deer would kill his canine adversaries or 

 fight his way through. " The dog that would fly into the face of 

 a sambar stag is perfectly certain to meet a glorious death," writes 

 Sir Samuel Baker, whose wide experience of this particular sport 

 lends authoritative weight to the statement; and Lloyd has 

 recorded how the Swedish Elk, when pressed by hungry wolves, 

 will strike one dead with a single blow. Referred to a similar 

 purpose, the horns of Antelopes, which, from the point of view 

 of sexual combat, proved so great a puzzle to Darwin, exhibit 

 throughout their several types a corresponding adaptation. 

 Weapons that " seem singularly ill fitted " for the strife of rival 

 males, present when lowered to a carnivorous foe prepared to 

 spring a brace of spears in rest or sabres prompt to thrust on 

 either side. Sir Samuel Baker describes the horns of the Harte- 

 beest as "carefully arranged for defence"; and "it seems to be 

 undisputed that the spear-like horns of the Gemsbok are suffi- 

 ciently formidable to repel the attack of the Lion" (Lydekker). 

 Of the Beisa Antelope, Mr. Blanford writes that " their long, 

 straight horns are most deadly weapons"; and of the Sable 

 Antelope Mr. Selous tells us that " like the Roan Antelope and 



