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HE roebuck prefers a mountanous woody country to a plain one; was commous in country to a one; was formerly very common in Wales, in the north of England, and in Scotland; but at present the fpecies no longer exifts in any part of Great Britain, except in the Scottish highlands. In France they are more frequent; they are alfo found in Italy, Sweden, and Norway; and in Afia they are met with in Siberia*. The first that are met with in Great-Britain are in the woods on the fouth fide of Loch Rannoch, in Perthshire: the laft in thofe of Langwal, on the southern borders of Cathness: but they are moft numerous in the beautifull forests of Invercauld, in the midst of the Grampian hills. They are unknown in Ireland.

This is the left of the deer kind, being only three feet nine inches long, and two feet three inches high before, and two feet feven behind. The weight from 50 to 60lb. The horns are from eight

8. ROE

VOL. I.

*Bell's Travels.
G

to

to nine inches long, upright, round, and divided into only three branches; their lower part is fulcated lengthways, and extremely rugged; of this part is made handles for couteaus, knives, &c. The horns of a young buck in its fecond year are quite plain: in its third year a branch appears; but in the fourth its head is complete. The body is covered during winter with very long hair, well adapted to the rigor of the highland air; the lower part of each hair is afh-color; near the ends is a narrow bar of black, and the points are yellow: The hairs on the face are black, tipped with afh-color; the ears are long, their infides of a pale yellow, and covered with long hair; the spaces bordering on the eyes and mouth are black. During fummer its coat has a very different appearance, being very short and smooth, and of a bright reddish color.

The cheft, belly, and legs, and the infide of the thighs, are of a yellowish white; the rump is of a pure white: the tail is very fhort. On the outfide of the hind leg, below the joint, is a tuft of long hair.

The make of the roebuck is very elegant, and formed for agility. These animals do not keep in herds like other deer, but only in families; they bring two fawns at a time, which the female is obliged to conceal from the buck while they are very young. The flesh of this creature is reckoned a delicate food.

It is a tender animal, incapable of bearing great cold. M. de Buffon tells us that in the hard winter of 1709, the fpecies in Burgundy were almost destroyed, and many years paft before it was reftored again. I was informed in Scotland, that it is very difficult to rear the fawns; it being computed that eight out of ten of thofe that are taken from their parents die.

Wild roes during fummer feed on grafs, and are very fond of the

rubus

rubus faxatilis, called in the highlands the roebuck berry; but in winter time, when the ground is covered with fnow, they brouze on the tender branches of the fir and birch.

In the old Welsh laws, a roebuck was valued at the fame price as a fhe-goat; a ftag at the price of an ox; and a fallow deer was esteemed equal to that of a cow; or, as some say, a he-goat *.

It will not be foreign to the prefent fubject, to mention the vast horns frequently found in Ireland, and others fometimes met with in our own kingdom. The latter are evidently of the stag kind, but much stronger, thicker, heavier, and furnished with fewer antlers than those of the prefent race; of those some have been found on the fea-coast of Lancashire †, and a fingle horn was dug a few years ago out of the fands near Chefter. Thofe found in Ireland must be referred to the elk kind, but of a species different from the European, being provided with brow antlers, which that wants: neither are they of the Moofe deer, or American, which entirely agrees with the elk of Europe, as I have found by comparison. Entire skeletons of this animal are fometimes met with, lodged in a white marle; but more frequently beneath the turf-bogs. Not the faintest account (traditional or hiftoric) is left of the existence of these animals in our kingdom; fo that they may poffibly be ranked among those remains which foffilifts diftinguish by the title of diluvian.

Mr. Graham, factor to the Hudson's Bay Company, once gave me hopes of discovering the living animal. He informed me that he had received accounts from the Indians who refort to the factories,

Leges Wallica, 258.

† Ph. Tr. No. 422.

that

‡ No. 227. Boate's Nat. Hift. Ireland, 137.
G 2

FOSSIL

HORNS.

that there is found a deer, about seven or eight hundred miles west of York fort, which they call Wakesseu, and fay is vastly superior in fize to the common Moofe. But as yet nothing has transpired relating to fo magnificent an animal. The difference of size between the modern Moofe, and the owners of the foffil horns may be estimated by the following account. The largest horns of the American Moofe ever brought over, are only thirty-two inches long, and thirty-four between tip and tip. The length of one of the foffil horns is fix feet four inches. The space between tip and tip near twelve feet. The largest Moofe defcribed by any authentic voyager does not exceed the fize of a great horfe; that which I faw (a female) was fifteen hands high. But we must search for much larger animals to fupport the weight of our foffil horns. If Joffelyn's or Dudly's Moofe of twelve feet in height ever existed +, we may fuppofe that to have been a fpecies, which as population advanced, retired into diftant parts, into depths of woods unknown but to diftant Indians.

* A pair of this fize is preserved at Sir Patrick Bellew's, Bart. in the county of Louth. The great difference between the Moose horns and the Foffil is shewen in Plates VII. and IX. of my Synopfis of Quadrupeds.

+ Voy. to New England, 88. New England Rarities, 19. See alfo Mr. Dudly's account in Ph. Tranf. abridg. VII. 447.

** Without

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