VI.—The Mammoth in Siberia

Extract

We have surveyed the distribution of Mammoths' remains in Siberia, especially of those in which the soft parts have been preserved, and have found them distributed along its whole length from the Kara Sea to the peninsula of the Chukchi. We have seen that these remains are found in large numbers, and that the further north we travel, the more abundant do they become. That while in Central Siberia they are comparatively unfrequent, as we near the Arctic border-land, the river banks and tundras teem more and more with them, until in the Bear Islands and the islands of New Siberia the ground is largely composed of the bones of Mammoths and the associated animals. These very abnormal facts, which are now familiar enough, have naturally attracted a great amount of speculation, and the question has arisen on many sides, How came they here? As we have seen, the unsophisticated natives explain the presence among them of carcases of huge animals with their flesh intact, by the elementary theory that the animals are still alive and live underground, dying only when exposed to the sun light.