Page:History of Manchester (1771), Volume 1, by John Whitaker.djvu/369

 $$ Si ^ ft'E H I S tO H Y O Book*. ".' Branching : Wns of a mod extraordinary fizeiiave beeirdiica- "re*e4 frequently ii> feveral parts of England and Ireland ; and 4bme of them were ftill fattened to the heads of their owners 4. •The diicovery of them equally in Ireland and in England, and the great frequency of the difcovery in both, fhew the original proprietors- to have been certainly natives of Britain. The horns have been fuppofed by lbnie, and- they are aflerted by the tra- dition of Ireland, to be actually the horns of an elk. But as that animal appears plainly from its Latin appellation, of Alee ©r Elk agnong us to have never been a native of Britain, fo are- its horns at once very different in figure and much inferior in fize tothefe. The horns appear plainly to be the relicks of deer* and are undoubtedly therefore the antlers of a large ftout breed of 'large- Several of the horns werefb enormoufly tall, that the faireft antlers. of our prefent deer would appear as infigilificant 4» the. comparison with them as the young flioots of a fawn compared with the beams of a buck. Some of the horns branch- ed 6ut to fo enormous a width, that the tip of the one was nearly -eAev$n feet diftant from the tip of the. other ; t The bceedL is> . flaw, loft in Britain and in Europe. But as it ftill feems to Hdb— fift.in the Moofe of America, fo it feems 'to have been origi- . utally frequent in the north of Germany ; the horns of the. rnoofe 4&d the aptlers discovered in the BritifK iiles being nearly of .the fame (Undard:^ and the Amerkan Moofe and theSjeytbian .manner-: The body of th$ former isfbid by the moft cijcuia- . #antial defcribers of the Modfe to be about the fize of a. bull, and the body of the latter is declared by the one only d^fcribfr, of the Tarandus to be about the.bignefs. of an ox. The, former is aflerted to have a neck refembling a flag's, and* the latter ;a> . head greater than a flag's and jaot unlike it. And both are men- tioned to have large branching j>orns, cloven hoofs, and Shaggy . hides 5 . Thefe muft have been denominated by the Britoos . Seghs, r Oxen,, or Savage Deer, as Segh a&ually fignifies aa ox at prefent^ and as in an old Irifh gloflary it is interpreted a Savage ..•■,-' • Deeix
 * ©ur BritHh deer* The breed muft have been uncommonly
 * Tarandus bping defer it^d by the hatu? alifts .3xa£Uy i* the fame