Alces machlis, the Elk or Moose, is a circumpolar species with palmated antlers and is of large size. The young are unspotted. This animal is the largest of the Deer tribe. The aspect of this creature is by no means that of a Deer, the long, thick, and rather prehensile upper lip not by any means suggesting the family to which it belongs; the legs, too, are ungainly through their unusual length. The Moose has a curious method of protecting himself from Wolves. Instead of moving about during heavy snowstorms, and being thus on the heavy ground an easy prey for these agile enemies, the animal forms what is known as a "Moose yard." An area of ground is kept well
trampled down, and the animal contents itself with browsing upon the adjacent stems. The well-trampled ground gives an easy footing, and by his powerful horns the great stag is able to keep his enemies at bay.
Fig. 156.—Moose. Alces machlis. × 1⁄20.
Rangifer tarandus, the Reindeer, is unique among Deer by reason of the fact that both sexes wear antlers. These antlers are palmated. The brow tine and the next or bez tine are also palmated and are directed forwards and a little downwards. The young are unspotted. The pelage alters in winter. Like the Moose, the Reindeer is circumpolar. As is well known, during the Pleistocene period the Reindeer extended its range as far as the South of France. Even in the historic period it is said to have been hunted in Caithness.
Reindeer, like so many other particularly Arctic animals, have regular migrations. In Spitzbergen, for instance, the animal migrates in the summer to the inland region of the island, and in
the autumn back again to the sea coast to browse upon the seaweed. These migrating herds have been stated to be led by a large female.
Fig. 157.—Reindeer. Rangifer tarandus. × 1⁄15.
Sub-Fam. 2. Moschinae.—Moschus moschiferus[[195]] is a native of the Asiatic Highlands. It is 3 feet or so high, perfectly hornless, and with very large canines in the male. It is noteworthy that in Hydropotes, where the canines are also very large, horns are absent. These are examples, perhaps, of correlation. The musk sac (whence the name) is present on the abdomen of the male only. There is no crumen or suborbital gland, which is so generally (though by no means universally) present in Cervidae. But the male has, in addition to the musk glands, glands near the tail and on the outside of the thigh. Unlike other Deer, the lachrymal bone of Moschus bears but one orifice. The feet, so far as concerns the preservation of the outer rudimentary