86 Smithsonian Exploration in Alaska in 1904 



exactly the middle between the two points of the peninsula, and is 

 two miles long; and in the place where the mammoth was found, 

 this rock has a [608] perpendicular elevation of thirty or forty 

 toises (from 180 to 240 feet). Its substance is a clear pure ice ; it 

 inclines towards the sea ; its top is covered with a layer of moss and 

 friable earth fourteen inches in thickness. During the heat of the 

 month of July a part of this crust is melted, but the rest remains 

 frozen. Curiosity induced me to ascend two other hills at some 

 distance from the sea ; they were of the same substance, and less 

 covered with moss. In various places were seen enormous pieces 

 of wood of all the kinds produced in Siberia ; and also mammoths' 

 horns, in great numbers, appeared between the hollows of the rocks ; 

 they all were of astonishing freshness. The escarpment of ice was 

 from thirty-five to forty toises high ; and according to the report of 

 the Tungusians, the animal was, when they first saw it, seven toises 

 below the surface of the ice. * * * ' 



" I have to observe in this passage, that it contains no decisive 

 evidence to show that the ice seen by Mr. Adams on the front of 

 the cliff from which the elephant had fallen was anything more 

 than a superficial facing, similar to that found by Captain Beechey 

 on parts of the front of the earthy cliff in Eschscholtz Bay ; the 

 same cliff which, a few 5'ears before, when visited by Kotzebue, 

 seems to have been so completely incased with a false fronting of 

 ice as to induce him to consider the entire hill to be a solid iceberg. 

 One thing, however, is certain as to this mammoth, viz., that 

 whether it was imbedded in a matrix of pure ice or of frozen earth, 

 it must have been rapidly and totally enveloped in that matrix be- 

 fore its flesh had undergone decay, and that whatever may have 

 been the climate of the coast of Siberia in antecedent periods, not 

 only was it intensely cold within a few days after the mammoth 

 perished, but it has also continued cold from that time to the pres- 

 ent hour. 



" Remains of the rhinoceros also appear to be nearly co-extensive 

 with those of the elephant in these northern regions. Pallas men- 

 tions the head of a rhinoceros which was found near Lake Baikal, 

 near Tshikoi, and four heads and five horns of this animal from 

 various parts of Siberia on the Irtis, the Alei, the Obi, and the 

 Lena. These horns in the frozen districts are so well preserved 

 that splices of them are used by the natives to strengthen their bows. 



" Pallas conceived that these remains are not derived from 

 animals that ever inhabited Siberia, but from carcasses drifted 

 northward from the southern regions by some violent aqueous 



