Fig. 57.—Skeleton of Great Irish Deer, Cervus giganteus, from shell-marl beneath the peat, Ireland. Antlers over 9 feet across.
Two entire skeletons of the male, with antlers measuring a little over nine feet from tip to tip, and one skeleton of the hornless doe, are to be seen set up in the middle of the long gallery No. 1 at the Natural History Museum. The drawing in [Fig. 57] is from a specimen in the Museum of the Royal College of Surgeons (Lincoln’s Inn Fields). The height of this specimen to the summit of the antlers is 10 ft. 4 in. The span of the antlers, from tip to tip, is 8 ft. (in the living Moose it is only 4 ft). The weight of the skull and antlers together is 76 lbs., but those of another specimen belonging to the Royal Dublin Society weigh 87 lbs. This great extinct deer surpassed the largest Wapite (Cervus Canadensis) in size, and its antlers were very much larger, wider, and heavier. In some cases the antlers have measured more than 11 ft. from tip to tip. The body of the animal, as well as its antlers, were larger and stronger than in any existing deer. The limbs are stouter, as might be expected from the great weight of the head and neck. Another and more striking feature is the great size of the vertebræ of the neck; this was necessary in order to form a column capable of supporting the head and its massive antlers. (See [Plate XXV.])
THE GREAT IRISH DEER, CERVUS MEGACEROS.
Height to the summit of the antlers 10 feet; spread of antlers 11 feet.
The first tolerably perfect skeleton was found in the Isle of Man, and presented by the Duke of Athol to the Edinburgh Museum. It was figured in Cuvier’s Ossemens Fossiles. Besides those already mentioned at South Kensington and Dublin, there is one in the Woodwardian Museum at Cambridge.
It cannot be doubted that, like all existing deer, the animal shed its antlers periodically, and such shed antlers have been found. When it is recollected that all the osseous matter of which they are composed must have been drawn from the blood carried along certain arteries to the head, in the course of a few months, our wonder may well be excited at the vigorous circulation that took place in these parts.