678 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



shells of small land-snails, mostly extinct in this region, 1 though yet 

 extant in high mountain-regions. So abundant are they as to give to 

 this soil the popular name of " snail-shell soil." The preservation of 

 animal and vegetable remains in the gravelly deposits of our lowlands 

 is naturally rare, comparatively, they being, for the most part, soon 

 destroyed'in beds so loose and permeable by air and water. And yet 

 in Germany, France, Belgium, England, Switzerland, and other parts 

 of Europe, there are found, in this very formation, the bones and teeth 

 of mammals, mostly of long-extinct species, the nearest congeners of 

 which are now native either to Africa and Asia, or else to the colder 

 parts of Northern Europe and America, and the higher Alps and Pyr- 

 enees. Bones of these same species, and hence of the same geological 

 era, are found in numerous caves as well; some species, indeed, being 

 almost wholly thus preserved. Among the better known of these caves 

 we may cite those of the Suabian and Franconian Juras, and the 

 Gailenreuther Cave, from which nearly every important cabinet of 

 Europe has been enriched. 



Prominent among the buried mammals of the drift are the mam- 

 moth (Elephas primogenius), the immense teeth and tusks of which 

 are so often exposed by our river-currents, and during excavations for 

 buildings, besides the many entire carcasses found in the ice and 

 frozen soil of Siberia. In many of these latter cases, the skin, the hair 

 proper, a reddish-brown, long, hairy wool, and a mane still longer, are 

 kept in perfect preservation. The latest discoveredof these was vis- 

 ited by the naturalist Schmidt, but the wild beasts had anticipated 

 his comings and devoured most of the flesh. Middendorf estimates 

 the number found in that region at several thousands. Their tusks 

 considerably curved, and eight to ten feet in length are in quantities 

 still sufficient to be the staple of a not inconsiderable trade in ivory. 

 Brandt believes the mammoth to have been somewhat larger than the 

 East Indian elephant of to-day, with tusks of much greater curvature. 



Next in size to the mammoth was a rhinoceros, characterized by 

 two horns and an osseous nasal septum [Rhinoceros tichorhinus). Its 

 teeth are often met with, and, some fifteen years ago, an almost entire 

 and perfectly preserved carcass was found in the ice on the river Wil- 

 ni in Siberia. 2 



Equally abundant with the remains of these two are those of the 

 cave-bear ( Ursus spelrmts), which was about the match in size of the 

 polar bear. It is found in the drift of the open country, and in the 

 caves of the same age. 



The peat-beds of Ireland yield entire skeletons of the giant-elk 



1 The reference is to the author's own picture of the Upper Rhine Valley, of course. 

 Translator. 



2 Dana (" Manual of Geology," American edition of 1863, page 561) mentions a simi- 

 lar discovery in 1772, in the same locality. This species of the rhinoceros, like the 

 mammoth, was protected by long, woolly hair. Trans. 



