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POPULAR SCIENCE REVIEW. 
horns, and lower jaw of a reindeer found by Mr. Moss at Bally- 
beta, near the Golden Ball, in the county of Dublin but the 
most remarkable discovery was that of a perfect skull and antler 
brought before the Eoyal Dublin Society by Dr. Carte in 1863.* 
The antlers are quite perfect and are still attached to the skull. 
The discovery was made in 1861, on the verge of the Curragh 
bog, near Ashbourne, in the county of Dublin. It is, beyond all 
doubt, the most magnificent specimen of reindeer that has ever 
been found in the fossil state. Dr. Carte also mentions three 
antlers which were found at Coonagh, on the south side of the 
Shannon, in county Clare. Thus in Ireland, also, the animal was 
rare, as compared with the Irish elk, or the Bos longifrons. 
In the pre-historic deposits of Germany the remains of the 
animal have also been found. Professor Nillson quotes them from 
the peat bogs of Pomerania, in which they are very abundant 
{An. Mag. Nat Hist, Ser. 2, vol. iv., 1849, p. 264), and doubtless 
they will be found in many other localities as attention is more 
and more concentrated on the pre-historic animals. In Southern 
Germany, Dr. Oscar Fraas describes a very interesting refuse- 
heap at Schussenried, in Upper Swabia, in which the remains 
of reindeer were associated with those of the bear, glutton, 
and arctic fox, and large quantities of flint implements of the 
unpolished kind. In Switzerland its bones have been found in 
a pre-historic cavern at rEchelle,| near Geneva, in association 
with worked flints, and the remains of the ox and horse. Thus 
scanty is the evidence of the existence of the animal in pre- 
historic times, but it is sufficient to prove that it still lingered 
in regions far to the south of its present habitat. 
If we turn to history we shall see that the animal has been re- 
treating northwards at least during the last two thousand years. 
In Caesar’s time it dwelt in the great Hercynian forest that over- 
shadowed Germany. He describes it as X an ox in the shape of 
a stag,” and as ‘‘ having one antler springing from the middle of 
its forehead, between the ears, loftier and more directed forwards 
than any known to the Eomans. From its palm-like top, branches 
spread widely. In both male and female there is the same na- 
ture — the same form and magnitude of antlers.” This descrip- 
tion has been considered by many of no value at all, and as 
the pure invention of Caesar’s brain. It seems to me, however, 
a very natural explanation of the difficulties of the passage, if we 
* Geol. Mag., yol. iii., No. xii., p. 546. 
+ Lubbock, Pre-bistoric Man. 
t De Bello Gallico lib. yi., cap. xxyi. — ^^Est bos ceryi figura, cujus a 
media fronte inter aures unum cornu exsistit, excelsius, magisque directum 
his quae nobis nota sunt cornibus. Ab ejus summo, sicut palmae, rami quam 
late diffunduntur. Eadem est foeminae marisque natura, eadeni forma magni- 
tudoque comuum.” 
