The distance through the
chest and point of the heart from side to side was, in this case,
exactly four and one-half inches. A man's hand, as shown in the
photograph, can easily grasp the whole lower chest of a deer, placing
thumb and forefinger over the heart on opposite sides. (2) The heart of
a deer, and indeed of all ruminant animals, lies close against the chest
walls and is easily reached and wounded. The chest cartilage, except in
an old deer, is soft; the ribs are thin and easily crushed, and the
spaces between the ribs are wide enough to admit a man's finger, to say
nothing of a wolf's fang. In this case the point of the heart, as the
deer lay on his side, was barely five eights of an inch from the
surface. (3) Any dog or wolf, therefore, having a spread of jaws of four
and one-half inches, and fangs three quarters of an inch long, could
easily grasp the chest of this deer from beneath and reach the heart
from either side. As the jaws of the big northern wolf spread from six
to eight inches and his fangs are over an inch long, to kill a deer in
this way would require but a slight effort.
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