TRAITS AND HABITS OF THE ELK 305 



shorter, and its depth much less. It has been 

 observed that in mild winters the migrating 

 herds are much smaller than in seasons of greater 

 snowfall. On both sides of the mountain range 

 many elk are victims of slaughter during these 

 semi-annual pilgrimages, at the hands of peasant 

 hunters.^ Periodical migrations of the sort here 

 described are unknown among the moose of 

 America. 



We cannot wonder that the German name of the 

 elk was interpreted as meaning "misery," or that 

 Prof. Oken denominated the animal ein melan- 

 cholisches Tier, when we read of the diseases and 

 parasites which attack him. Blasius says that 

 about every tenth year elk suffer seriously from 

 malignant anthrax {milzbrmid) , rinderpest, and 

 scour, traceable perhaps to the effects of seasons of 

 drouth; that they are subject to pulmonary and 

 other diseases to which ruminants generally are 

 exposed; and that many sorts of parasites afflict 

 them, often with serious results.'^ In 175 1 all the 

 elk on the great island of Oesel in the Baltic Sea 

 died of mihbrand; in 1752 the disease carried off 



s Martenson, p. 100. 



^ Allgemeine Naturgeschichte jur alle Stdnde (Stuttgart, 1 838), voL 

 vii.,p. 1315. 



7 Ubi supra, p. 278. 

 20 



