15$ 



SCIENTIFIC NEWS. 



discovery. 



tivated nations of the north. Lately however one has been 

 found, not alive indeed, but complete, and in a stare of per- 

 fect preservation, on the borders of the Frozen ocean. The 

 following is the account, that has .been received of it from 

 Petersburg. 



Schoumachoff, a Tnngoose chief, about the end of august 

 1799? when the fishing in the river Lena was over, repaired 

 according to annual custom to the seaside. Leaving his 

 family in their huts, he coasted along the shore in quest of 

 mammoth's tusks, and one day perceived in the midst of a 

 rock of ice a large shapeless block, not at all resembling the 

 logs of drift wood eotnrao lily found there. He climbed the 

 rock, and examined it all round* but could not make out 

 what it. was. The next year, visiting the same spot, he 

 found there the carcase of a seacow (tr'rchccus rosmarvs) ; 

 and observed, not only t^at the mass he had seen the year be- 

 fore was freer from ire, but that there were two similar pieces 

 b}' the side of it. These afterward turned out to be the feet 

 of the mammoth. In 1801, the side of the animal and one 

 of its tusks appearing very distinctly, he acquainted his wife 

 and some of his fiends with what he had found. This 

 however gave them great alarm, for the old men said, that 

 they had been told by their forefathers a similar monster was 

 onee before seen in those parts, and the whole family of the 

 person who discovered it soon became extinct. At this 

 Schoumachoff was so much alarmed, that he fell sick. On 

 his recovery however he could not relinquish the expectation 

 of the profit he might make of the tusks; and directed his 

 servants to conceal the circumstance carefully, and endea- 

 vour to keep away all strangers by some pretext or other. 

 Jt was not till the fifth year, that the ice had melted suffici- 

 ently to disengage the mammoth, when it fell over on its 

 sule upon a bank of sand. Schoumachoff then cut off the 

 tusks, which he bartered for goods to the value of 50 rubles 

 [ct'll. 5*.] with a Russian merchant. Being satisfied with 

 Its flesh eaten this, the carcase was left to be devoured by the bears, wolves, 



by Hop and a f except what the Yakouts in the neighbourhood 



wilo beasts. r , ° 



cut off to feed their dogs. Previous to this indeed he 



Drawing of it. had a rude drawing made of it, which represents it with 



pointed ears, very small eyes, horse's hoofs, and a bristly 



mane 



Tradition of 

 another. 



