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 756 DEEMS upon inquiry, and if followed up would have led to the requisite information, will preclude the subsequent purchaser from taking advan- tage of the want of record; in other words, with such knowledge or notice, he will not be held a purchaser in good faith within the mean- ing of the recording laws. As between the parties to a deed, neither acknowledgment nor record is in general required, though in some states acknowledgment is necessary, and in others the deed is void as against subsequent purchasers unless recorded within a time fixed by statute. DEEMS, Charles F., D. D., an American clergy- man, born in Baltimore, Md., Dec. 4, 1820. He graduated at Dickinson college in 1839, and soon after became agent of the American Bible society for the state of North Carolina. Re- signing the agency, he became in 1840 profes- sor of logic and rhetoric in the university of North Carolina, and retained this position five years, after which he was for a year professor of natural science in Randolph Macon college, Virginia. Returning to North Carolina, he was stationed as preacher at New Berne, and in 1846 was chosen delegate to the general con- ference of the M. E. church south, which met at St. Louis. While here he was appointed president of the Greensboro female college in North Carolina, where he remained five years. From 1854 to 1858 he was in the reg- ular pastorate, and from 1858 to 1865 was presiding elder of the Wilmington and New Berne districts of the North Carolina confer- ence. At the close of 1865 he went to New York, was occupied for a time in journalism, and subsequently engaged in establishing the " Church of the Strangers," of which he is now (1873) the pastor. Besides many sermons and addresses, he has published several vol- umes, among which are " The Home Altar," "What Now?" "The Annals of Southern Methodism," and " The Life of Jesus." DEEP RIVER, one of the head streams of Cape Fear river, North Carolina. It rises in Guilford co., flows S. E. through Randolph co., then nearly due E. into Chatham co., where it unites with Haw river to form the Cape Fear. It is about 100 m. long, and fur- nishes good water power. It has been ren- dered navigable from its mouth to the coal mines in Chatham co. DEEP-SEA SOUNDINGS. See ATLANTIC OCEAN, vol. ii., p. 69. DEER, the common name applied to an ex- tensive group of ruminating animals, embraced in the family cermdce. This group, which in- cludes animals varying in size from the small muntjac to the gigantic moose, is characterized 'in most genera by the presence in the males of solid horns arising from the frontal bone, falling off annually in the large species, and covered when first developed by a hairy skin. They are remarkable generally for their light- ness and elegance, the velocity of their move- ments, and the timidity of their disposition ; DEER they are found in all parts of the world except Australia, and are valuable as furnishing food, clothing, and beasts of draught for many northern nations. , The forms of the horns or antlers are various, being sometimes flat and palmated as in the moose, or nearly round and branching as in the stag ; their substance is very different from horn, being compact and solid, without any central core like that of the antelope and ox family; their production is intimately connected with the generative func- tion. In the young animal a kind of exostosis, or bony growth of great hardness, is percep- tible on each side of the frontal bone ; this in- creases rapidly, pushing the skin before it ; the enlarged vessels are compressed and obliter- ated by the growing horn, the cutaneous en- velope dies, and the exposed horn in time is cast off; under the wound, which rapidly cicatrizes, a new horn soon rises with a burr around it; during the rutting season the re- production of the horn is most active, with considerable heat and irritation ; when it is fully developed the skin falls as before, leaving the hard and bare horn, which falls and is re- produced ; at each successive growth the horn increases in size and complexity, but its dura- tion is the same. When the horns fall, the animal retires into the thick forest, not ap- pearing among the females until these organs reappear; when the horns are covered, they are said to be "in the velvet." The origin of the horns is called the burr, the main shaft the beam, and the branches the antlers ; the latter may be near the head, when they are termed brow antlers, or in the middle of the beam (median or bezantlers) ; the termination of the beam is sometimes styled a perch, and the small processes snags and prickets. The teeth of the deer are eight incisors in the lower jaw, and none in the upper, in their place being a callous pad; generally there are no canines, but these exist in the upper jaw alone in a few species ; there is a space between the incisors and the grinders, the latter being six on each side in each jaw, with the crown marked by the disposition of the enamel in two double crosses, whose convexity is turned inward in the upper teeth, and outward in the lower. The feet end in two toes, each with its sharp hoof, resembling a single hoof which has been cleft ; behind and above these are two small rudimentary toes or hoofs. The two meta- carpal and metatarsal bones are united into a single cannon-bone. The head is long, and terminated in most by a muzzle ; the ears are large, the pupils elongated, and the tongue soft ; there are four inguinal teats. The skeleton is constructed for lightness and rapid springing motions ; the neck is long to permit grazing, and the spines of the dorsal vertebrae are long and strong for the origin of the thick ligamentum nuchso to support the ponderous head ; the cavity of the skull is small, in con- formity with the limited intelligence of the group. The internal structure is that of other