Pallas 8 1 



in every direction. After six years of unwearied labour, 

 and almost incredible suffering and privation, during which 

 Pallas had from time to time sent home accounts of his 

 more important observations, he returned in July 1*7 74. 



Never before had so large a store of observations in all 

 departments of natural history, extending over so wide a 

 region of the earth's surface, been gathered in so brief a time. 

 Pallas wrote his results in German (his native language, 

 for he was born at Berlin in 1741), and sent them home 

 as they were ready. They were published at St. Peters- 

 burg between 1772 and 1776, in three quarto volumes. 

 They were afterwards translated into French, and appeared 

 at Paris during the years from 1788 to 1793, 1 in five 

 handsome quartos, with a folio atlas of plates. 



Pallas was an accomplished naturalist, and made some 

 original and valuable contributions to zoology. But it is 

 only with his geological work that we are here concerned. 

 One of the geological questions which especially interested 

 him was the occurrence of the remains of huge pachy- 

 derms in the superficial deposits of the north of Siberia. 

 These remains, as far back as the latter years of the 

 seventeenth century, had been known to exist, for a trade 

 in the ivory tusks of fossil elephants from the Siberian 

 coasts and rivers had before that time been carried on. 

 The actual bones of these animals were subsequently dis- 

 interred by observers capable of describing their mode of 

 occurrence, so that Pallas had his curiosity much excited 

 by the accounts which had already been published. There 

 was still much to be found out regarding these strange 



1 Another edition of this translation appeared in 8 volumes 8vo, and 

 was reprinted at Bale in 1806. 



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