212 EXTINCT MONSTERS. 



the habits of extinct animals ; and too much reliance must not 

 be placed on arguments derived from the habits of their living 

 descendants or their near relations. The older geologists fell 

 into this mistake with regard to the Mammoth, as did even 

 Cuvier. Modern elephants are at present restricted to regions 

 where trees flourish with perennial foliage, and, therefore, it was 

 argued that there must have been a change of climate — either 

 gradual or sudden, in the country of the Mammoth. 



Cuvier, who believed in sudden revolutions on the earth's 

 surface, argued that the Mammoth could not possibly have lived 

 in Siberia as it is now ; and that, at the very moment when the 

 beast was destroyed, the land was suddenly converted into a 

 glacial region ! (" C'est done le meme instant qui a fait perir les 

 animaux, et qui a rendu glacial le pays qu'ils habitaient, cet 

 evenement a ete subit, instantane, sans aucune gradation." ^) Sir 

 Charles Lyell argued, from geological evidence with regard to 

 the rise of land along the Siberian coast, that the climate had 

 become somewhat more severe, and that finally the Mammoth, 

 though protected by its shaggy coat, died out on account of 

 scarcity of food. ^ 



Professor Owen is unwilling to believe that such changes as 

 these brought about the final extinction of the Mammoth, and he 

 concludes that it was quite possible for such an animal to have 

 flourished as near to the North Pole as is compatible with the 

 growth of hardy trees or shrubs. 



" The fact seems to have been generally overlooked, that an 

 animal organised to gain its subsistence from the branches or 

 woody fibre of trees, is thereby rendered independent of the 

 seasons which regulate the development of leaves and fruit ; the 

 forest food of such a species becomes as perennial as the lichens 

 that flourish beneath the winter snows of Lapland ; and, were 

 such a quadruped to be clothed, like the reindeer, with a natural 



' Osse/nens Fossiles, torn. i. p. io8. 



- See 'J he Principles of Geology, vol. i. chap. x. 



