being prolonged and acute, and consisting of the successive sounds of the vowels
a, o, u, (french,) uttered with so much strength as to offend the ear. The cry of
the European stag, when compared to it, is dull and base, though not deficient in
strength. The velvety covering shrivels and is rubbed off the horns of the
Wapiti in the month of October, at the commencement of the rutting season, but
the horns themselves do not fall until the months of March or April. Two male
Wapitis were found near Edmonton-house, lying dead, with their horns locked
into each other, and the moose and rein deer are reported to have occasionally
died under similar circumstances. The flesh of the Wapiti is coarse, and is
little prized by the natives, principally on account of its fat being hard like suet.
It seemed to me to want the juiciness of venison, and to resemble dry but small
grained beef. Its hide, when made into leather, after the Indian, fashion, is said
not to turn hard in drying after being wet, and in that respect to excel moose or
rein-deer leather.
The wawaskeesh of the Saskatchewan River was long considered by the
Fur Traders as the same with the red-deer1 or stag of Europe, and its resemblance
to that animal is, indeed, so great, that, .as M. F. Cuvier, states, their
specific differences become apparent only when an opportunity occurs of comparing
them with each other, and of attentively studying their manners when they are
placed under similar circumstances. Pennant, without having seen a specimen
of the true wawaskeesh, or, as he writes it, waskesse, applies that name to the
moose, probably misled by the appellation of “ grey moose,” which was given
to the wapiti in contradistinction to the name of “ black moose,” which was appropriated
to the Cerms alces,. Its trivial name of “ wapiti” has been only recently
adopted in scientific works, but is preferable to the appellations either of elk,
grey-moose, or red-deer, which have already been the means of confounding it
with other species. A number of live specimens were brought from the Missouri
to Europe some years ago, and were by several authors described as a new
species, and introduced into the catalogues under the name of Cerms Wapiti.
Several Hudson’s-Bay Traders, however, well acquainted with the wawaskeesh,
recognised it at once in the wapiti shewn in England; and my recollections of two
recent specimens of the wawaskeesh, which I had an opportunity of examining on
the Saskatchewan, induce me to conform without hesitation to their opinion. It is
also without doubt the Canada stag of various authors, but, as M. F. Cuvier has
observed, the want of a pale mark on the rump in Perrault’s figure is sufficient to
excite a doubt of its being the Cerms Canadensis * of that author. Indeed, I do
Perrault, Mem. sur les An., vol. ii. p. 45.
not think it at all improbable that his figure is that of the Cervus macrotis, which
may hereafter prove to be an inhabitant of Upper Canada *.
D E S C R IP T IO N .
Translated from the Hist. Naturelle des Mammifères.
The height of the wapiti at the shoulders is 4J feet, whilst that of the European stag is
more than a foot less. They agree with each other in the form and proportions of their
heads and limbs, hut they differ in their respective tints of colour, that of the common stag
being an uniform blackish-brown, whilst the wapiti has all its superior parts and the lower
jaw of a pretty lively yellowish-brown, and a black mark extends from the angle of the mouth
along the side of the lower jaw. There is a whitish circle round the eye of . the European
animal, but in the American one this circle is brown.
The common stag has generally the first antlers turned upwards at their points, whilst in
the wapiti these antlers are depressed in the direction of the facial line, and this character
appears to be constant. The neck in both species has a deeper tint of colour than the sides
of the body; it is blackish-brown in the European stag, and mixed red and black in the
American one, with coarse black hairs depending from it like a dewlap ; and this colour,
which changes to a brown mixed with white from the shoulders to the hips in the former,
becomes a clear French-gray in the same parts of the latter. In both, the limbs have a
deeper brown colour anteriorly than posteriorly ; and both also have a very pale yellowish
spot on the buttocks, bounded on the thighs by a black line, and the tail is likewise of this
yellowish colour, but' it is nearly seven inches long in the European stag, whilst it is
scarcely two and a half in the Canadian one. The : colours here mentioned are those which
exist at the commencement of the autumn.
The hair of the wapiti is of mean, length on the. shoulders, the back, the flanks, the thighs,
and the under part of the head: .the sides and.the limbs are.clothed with shorter hairs ; but
they are very long on the sides of the head posteriorly and on the neck, particularly beneath,
where they form,. as has been mentioned above, a kind of dewlap ; and there is on the
posterior and outer aspect of the hind-leg a brush of tawny hair which surrounds a narrow,
long, horny substance. The ears are white interiorly, and clothed with tufted hairs ; exteriorly
their colour is the same with that of the neighbouring parts. There is a naked
triangular space round the lachrymal opening near the inner angle of the orbit. The hoofs of
the wapiti are small.
The wapiti, like the common stag, has very iarge lachrymal or suborbital openings +, a
muzzle, upper canine teeth, a soft tongue, coarse brittle hair, with a short wool beneath it, &c.
* The following passage occurs in the History of Canada by Theodat. “ Les cerfs gu'ils appellent Sconoton, sont
plus communs dans le pays des Neutres, cpi’en toutes les autres contréès Huronnes, mais ils sont un peu plus petits
nue les nostres de deqa, et très légers de pied.” The stag that he here speaks of as being smaller than the common
one cannot be the Wapiti. He mentions the Elk and Rein-deer, under their names of Eslan and Caribou, and he
refers probably to the Cervus Virginianus, by the appellation of Le Dain, which he says is an animal that he knew
merely by report as an inhabitant of North America. The country of the Neutres seems to have been on the
northern shores of Lake Huron near the River Nattawasaga.
f The Créés probably on this account term the wapiti “ stinking head.”