Habits 27 



Oligocene marls of Ronzon, in the department of Puy-en-Velay, France, 

 known as Gelocus. In this primitive little Ungulate the skull was devoid of 

 either horns or antlers, and the hinder cheek-teeth had very short crowns, 

 with low cusps and shallow depressions, but it is not improbable that upper 

 incisor teeth had disappeared. The lateral metacarpals and metatarsals 

 formed complete splints of bone, and in the hind limb the two median 

 metatarsals had coalesced to form a cannon-bone, although the corresponding 

 metacarpals remained distinct, as they do in the modern chevrotains. It has 

 been suggested that in this extinct ruminant we have the ancestral type of 

 both the chevrotains and the deer; and, in any case, it serves to show that 

 as we recede in time we depart further and further away from the modern 

 specialised types of the ruminant group. 



Habits. — Since a considerable amount of space is devoted in the sequel 

 to the habits of the individual species, a few observations will suffice on those 

 of the group as a whole. Like most large family groups, the deer tribe is 

 essentially an adaptive one, although in this respect it is decidedly inferior 

 to the Boviaa, many members of which have established themselves in desert 

 regions, where the Cervidce are almost entirely wanting. With the exception 

 of such desert regions, deer have succeeded in establishing themselves in 

 most districts of the countries into which they have been able to effect an 

 entrance. Members of the family are found from the ice-bound shores of 

 Greenland and the Arctic tundras of Siberia to the burning plains of Bengal 

 and Brazil ; while they are common to the dense grass-jungles and forests of 

 India and the open pampas of Argentina ; as they are to the latter and to 

 the heights of the Andes and the upland forests of the Himalaya. Never- 

 theless, as a group, they are mainly inhabitants of forests or scrub-covered 

 districts, especially where there are open tracts of grass near by on which 

 they can graze ; and many prefer the thin jungle on the borders of forests 

 to the forests themselves. The near neighbourhood of water seems to be 

 essential to the majority, if not indeed to all ; and many, like the elk, Pere 

 David's deer, and the Chinese water-deer, delight to spend a considerable 

 portion of their time in the water itself. The Virginian deer, too, may 

 often be seen swimming from island to island in the American lakes. 



While some kinds, such as the red deer, the fallow deer, the chital, and 

 the sikas, congregate in larger or smaller herds led — at least during the 

 breeding-season — by one or more of the older stags, others, like the elks, 



