468 On the Shou or Tibetan Stag. [No. 6. 



upward direction not greatly divaricating from the line of the beam,* 

 and, like it, inclined forward towards the tip. The beams are well 

 bent with a handsome backward slope as far as the central snag, beyond 

 which they rise rapidly, but still keeping their graceful curve. The 

 burrs are distinct but not large, and the points are sharp, save that of 

 the upper basal snag which is blunt and worn, owing apparently to 

 constant attrition with the earth caused by this snag's downward direc- 

 tion, and which must, I should imagine, have incommoded the living 

 animal when grazing. These splendid horns have a great similarity 

 of size, character and form to those of my Cervus affinis, the only 

 differences noticeable between the two, being that the snags of the 

 present subject are all put off from the beam somewhat more laterally 

 (outside), and that the brow antlers consequently do not incline so 

 directly over the face of the animal. The marked backward and 

 downward curve of the upper basal antler or snag of the Shou towards 

 its tip may be noted as a further subordinate distinction ; but, upon 

 the whole I conceive that the Shou is identical in species with my 

 Affinis, and I am thence led to conjecture that my sample of the latter, 

 though brought immediately from the Morung or Eastern Tarai, yet 

 had priorly been carried there by some Tibetan trader or traveller, 

 from whom it was obtained by some official of the Durbar of Nepaul. 

 Certain it is, at all events, that the species does not now inhabit the 

 Tarai, nor has done in the memory of the oldest inhabitant ; and also, 

 that the Durbar after much enquiry, at my suggestion, could only as- 

 certain positively that the sample presented to me came to it from the 

 Morung where it was believed to have been killed. With the Morung 

 the Tibetans have much intercourse, and therefore I am led to infer 

 that my first specimen may have come originally from Tibet, because 

 the species still abounds there, and is not, now at least, found in any 

 part of the Tarai. It is a noble animal, far superior in size to the 

 Stag of Europe, and equal to the Wapiti or American exemplar of the 

 genus. The Persian Stag and the Stag of Cashmere, not to add that 

 of Mantchuria, are very possibly identical with our species, which in 

 that event might be appropriately called the Asiatic Stag. Mean- 

 while, and pending the determination of these yet undescribed animals, 



* In " crowned" horns this divergency is always great, both in the complete 

 and incomplete states. 



