754 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



still sometimes found untainted. There they have lain hermetically- 

 sealed for many a long century, and now, when the rivers from time 

 to time wash away fragments of the great ice-cliffs, they reveal the 

 strange treasures of that wondrous storehouse sometimes a huge 

 unwieldy hippopotamus, or a rhinoceros, or it may be a great woolly 

 elephant with a mane like a lion and curly tusks ; and the hungry 

 Siberian bears and wolves fight and snarl over these dainty morsels, 

 which are still as fresh as though they had fallen but an hour ago. 



Here, in these marvelous ice-fields, lie inexhaustible stores of finest 

 ivory, and this it is which the learned professors of the Celestial 

 medical hall value so highly. So these precious tusks are dragged 

 forth after thousands of years, to be ground down and boiled to a 

 jelly for the cure of vulgar Chinese diseases of the nineteenth century ! 

 Alas, poor mammoth ! 



Nor are these the only antediluvian relics which are thus turned 

 to account. Professor H. N. Moseley tells us of the " dragon's teeth 

 and bones " which he bought from the druggists of Canton, where they 

 are sold by weight as a regular medicine, and are highly prized in 

 the materia medica both of China and Japan as specifics in certain 

 diseases. They proved on examination to be the fossil teeth and 

 bones of various extinct mammalia of the Tertiary period, including 

 those of the rhinoceros, elephant, horse, mastodon, stag, hippotherium, 

 and the teeth of another carnivorous animal unknown. 



He obtained a translation of the passage in the medical works of 

 Li She Chan which specially refers to the use of this medicine. It 

 states that " dragons' bones come from the southern parts of Shansi, 

 and are found in the mountains." Dr. To Wang King says that if 

 they are genuine they will adhere to the tongue. " This medicine is 

 sweet and is not poison. Dr. Koon certainly says that it is a little 

 poisonous. Care must be taken not to let it come in contact with fish 

 or iron. It cures heart-ache, stomach-ache, drives away ghosts, cures 

 colds and dysentery, irregularities of the digestive organs, paralysis, 

 etc., and increases the general health." 



Another medical authority, " The Chinese Repository," published 

 in Canton a. d. 1832, states that the bones of dragons are found on 

 banks of rivers and in caves of the earth, places where the dragon 

 died. Those of the back and brain are highly prized, being variegated 

 with different streaks on a white ground. The best are known by 

 slipping the tongue lightly over them. The teeth are of little firm- 

 ness. The horns are hard and strong ; but if these are taken from 

 damp places, or by women, they are worthless. 



From his examination of these so-called relics of the dragon (which 

 prove to belong to so many different animals, which in successive ages 

 have crept to the same cave to die), Mr. Moseley points out how some 

 imaginative person probably first devised a fanciful picture of the 

 mythical animal, combining the body of the vast lizard with the wings 



