466 A New Californian Deer. [ August, 
tant specific character, and, had other important similitudes been 
wanting, would have gone far to identify the species. I will not 
stop to point out other features peculiar to O. macrotis, but will 
rather describe the differences between this variety and that found 
east of the Sierra Nevadas. 
Those found in the low altitudes where we made our camp are 
hardly as large as those found on the high table-lands east of the 
Sierras and in the Rocky Mountains, but I learned that those 
found in the higher mountains, say five thousand feet or upwards 
above the sea, are very large. Mr. Frost once killed one in the 
high mountains which was believed to weigh four hundred pounds. 
This deer frequents higher altitudes than any other deer, being 
frequently found above the timber line. I have not the means of 
comparing those found at San Julian (that was the name of the 
ranch on which we made our camp) with any living on so low 
an altitude elsewhere. In color these deer had a decidedly more 
reddish shade than those east of the Sierras, much more ap- 
proaching the color of C. Colwmbianus. Those, however, found 
in high altitudes were described as of the dull gray color of the 
eastern variety. n the mule deer (Cervus macrotis), there is 
a snow-white section which commences just>above the root of 
the tail and extends down the buttock for several inches on each 
side to nearly the length of that member. This white section cn 
the specimens of the California variety which I examined was 
not quite so extensive as on the eastern variety, though in all 
other respects they were identical. But the most marked dis- 
tinction of this new variety was in the markings of the tail, On 
all the specimens I have examined or heard of east of the Sierras, 
the tail of C. macrotis is entirely white except a tuft of long 
hairs at the extremity, which is black. On all that I examined 
_ west of the Sierras a dark line extends down the upper side of 
the tail, and unites with the black tuft at the end. This line 
varied in depth of color on different specimens, but was always 
very distinctly present, never of a lighter color than on the back 
above, but frequently considerably darker as it approached of 
black tuft, always showing many tawny hairs, which in severa 
specimens invaded the tuft at the extremity ; this on the easter 
variety is always entirely black, except in summer, when it some" 
times fades to.a reddish shade. It was this dark line down jhe 
upper- side of the tail which first attracted my attention yet 
dried skins examined, and excited the suspicion that this mig 
be a new species of deer, which, however, was at once dispe# 
