C ERV US.
Animals of this genus are found in considerable variety and abundance in many different places, as in England Ireland, the Isle of Man, Germany, Sweden, France, Italy. Dalmatia, Gibraltar, and elsewhere. Most of them resem• ble some or other of the existing species, but it is by nc means certain that any one of them does actually belong to these, unless it he the stag and the roe. It may IN questioned, as before suggested, whether those found it peat only, should be considered as fossil animals. It is certain, at any rate, that these species occur in differen kinds of alluvia ; different, at least, in their antiquity ant origin, if not in their appearance ; but we have said all tha we have thought necessary on this, the geological part o the present subject, in another place. We need only re mark, what the description of some of these species Nvil serve to show, that some of these alluvia appear to hav( been produced by temporary and sudden causes, and tha others seem to have been the usual tedious accumula Lions produced by rivers or other gradual changes of thy surface.
The Red Deer, or a species resembling very strong]: the present one, occurs not very uncommonly in till: island, and in Ireland, as well as in different parts o Europe. Thus it has been found in the valley of Somme in France. In England their horns occur it Lancashire, Yorkshire, Derbyshire, Northamptonshire Oxfordshire, and Lincolnshire; and, most particularly o all, near Norwich and Harwich. In the latter place the: are associated with the bones of the elephant, elk, rhino ceros, and hippopotamus; and if there is no error respec ting the nature of this approximation, they have beet cotemporary animals. They are among the most super ficial of the fossil remains, and often can scarcely be con sidered as such, since they are found in peat. They also found in sand and superficial marly beds; and these we may also remark, are often of a date no more ancien than peats, being the deposits of pools and lake that have gradually been filled up, and then covered by the growth of that substance. The size of the bones,
and the magnitude and branches of the horns, are not, in this case, it must be remembered, any proofs of a dif ferent species; since it is well known that the sizes of the red deer in former times were often superior to any that are now found, and that their horns were also rougher and thicker, and bore more branches. This was apparently the consequence of greater age, of more food, and of less disturbance, when they were far more numerous than they are at present.
The Roe.—We are not aware that the roe has ever been found in a fossil state in our own country ; although it has always abounded in the living one, and is still common in Scotland. Two animals, or rather their remains, have been examined by Cuvier; the one occurring in peat near Somme, and the other near Orleans, in the same lime stone with the bones of the PaIxotherium ; and they have both been referred to this species. We have little doubt, from the situation of the former, that it is the species now existing ; but, although sufficiently distinct characters have not been found in the other to prove it a lost animal, its 'geological situation, and its association with another genus no longer existing, seem sufficient to determine this question in 'the affirmative.
The Fallow Deer.—It is said that the bones of the com mon fallow Deer are among those which occur in the rocks of Dalmatia. In France near Somme, and in Ger many, horns have been found which are considered to have belonged to a species different from the present, because they are much larger. As happens in the case of the red deer, we do not consider that the mere size, nor even the number of branches, of the horns, proves any thing re specting difference of species; and as they occur in loose sand, as those of the stag so often do, we are inclined to consider them as belonging to large specimens of the pre sent fallow deer.