THE FALLOW DEER 
a uniform greyish -brown; the back being very dark and lightening in 
colour towards the white parts. The foregoing are the typical summer 
and winter pelages of the English park fallow deer, which is in every way 
identical with the wild ones of North Palestine and Asia Minor, but after 
years of isolation and inter -breeding, our race has produced numerous 
aberrant forms as a result of whole or partial domestication. In some 
cases the colouring matter in the epidermis is lost, whilst in others it is 
excessive, thus we get white, erythristic and melanistic varieties, and 
it is not uncommon to see all these varieties in a large park, as well as 
the pure spotted form. 
In some parks the owners prefer to keep to one type. At Welbeck 
and Sledmere are white herds, in Epping Forest and many parks only 
the black-brown form exists. Other varieties are known as the bald- 
headed Fallow, strawberry -menil (dappled roan), silver grey, dark -dun, 
yellow-dun, and cream-yellow. 
The fawns of all these varieties are spotted as a rule, even the black- 
brown ones have pale brown spots, but I have seen them in Epping Forest 
without spots. 
The black variety has been repeatedly stated to have been introduced 
by James I, but, as Mr Harting has shown (“ Essays,” 1883, p. 13), 
there were black, white, and spotted fallow deer in Windsor Park in 
1465, and probably long before this. 
The horns of the Fallow buck begin to make their appearance in the 
summer of the second year and, when developed, are in the form of a 
single snag from two to five inches long. In the third year the brow and 
tray points are developed, and the top of the beam shows an inclination to 
palmate. In succeeding years this palmation increases and points are 
thrown out on the posterior margin. These increase with the breadth of 
the palm until the sixth year, when the horns are more or less fully 
developed. At the extreme lower end of the posterior margin of the palma- 
tion, Fallow bucks throw out a back point, sometimes to the length of 
eight or nine inches. The buck casts his horns generally from a fortnight 
to a month later than Red deer, consequently the horns are a fortnight 
to a month later in being completed. A pair of dropped horns usually 
weigh from 3 to 4 lb., but two very large pairs picked up at Petworth in the 
spring of 1900 I found weighed 6 lb. 8 oz., and 6 lb. 6 oz. 
The following are the measurements, which have all been taken by 
myself, of the largest British Fallow deer heads. 
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