34 
THE FORMEK RANGE OF THE REINDEER IN 
EUROPE. 
By W. BOYD DAWKINS, M.A., RR.S., F.G.S. 
T he Reindeer is the only member of the great genus Cervus 
fitted by nature to endure the extreme severity of an arctic 
winter. It thrives on the mosses that cover the great treeless 
spaces extending between the boundary of the woods and the 
great arctic sea, in Northern Europe, Asia and America, whicJi 
it seems to prefer to the more tender herbage further to the south. 
It is found also at the extreme edge of the woods both in Asia 
and America, and retreats to their recesses to find some sort of 
shelter and food during the depth of the winter. South of its 
habitat lies the region of the elk and the red-deer, the exact 
boundary being regulated according to the season. Thus in an 
unusually warm summer the two latter animals advance north- 
wards into the country of the reindeer, while in an unusually 
severe winter the reindeer passes southwards in search of food, 
as Sir John Franklin found out to his cost in his overland 
journey from the great arctic ocean. In this way the boundary 
is continually oscillating to and fro. The reindeer has been 
met with in the highest northern latitudes yet reached b}^ our 
explorers. It abounds in Greenland and Spitsbergen, and has 
even crossed over on the ice to the cluster of islands off the 
Siberian coast, called New Siberia. In the highlands of Norway 
and Sweden it is also found, as well as in the loftier regions of 
the Urals. Such is its present range. In past time, how- 
ever, it wandered over a vast area far to the south and west of 
its present abode ; what that range was and the causes of its 
modification are subjects well worthy of research, on account of 
the light they throw on European climate in former days. 
It has indeed been objected, that although climate exercises a 
great influence in modifying range it does not exert the only 
influence, and therefore that any argument from one to the other 
is faulty. The Bengal tiger is of the same species as that which 
preys on the Tartar horses on the shores of the Caspian, and on 
the reindeer of Eastern Asia. The fox and the wolf are also, as 
Pennant, Arctic Zoology, vol. i. p. 24. 
