308 PICTURESQUE SKETCHES. 



fresher and whiter than those on the main land ; and 

 a sand-bank on the western side of one of them 

 proved, on one occasion, a most productive spot, the 

 sea, after a long continuance of easterly winds, wash- 

 ing an abundant supply of bones on the bank, as if 

 from some vast submarine store. 



In the latter part of the summer of 1799, a native 

 Tungusian fisherman, who was in the habit of col- 

 lecting tusks for sale from among the blocks of ice 

 and rubbish which had fallen from the cliffs, saw 

 on the banks of Lake Oncoul, near the mouth of the 

 Lena river, and projecting from the cliff, a mass of 

 unusual form, but, from its shapeless appearance, he 

 could make nothing of it. The year after, proceed- 

 ing to his usual haunt, he noticed that this lump was 

 somewhat disengaged and had two projecting parts; 

 and towards the end of the summer of 1801, when 

 he again looked at it, he found it to consist of the 

 whole side of a gigantic animal having large tusks, 

 one of which projected from the ice. So slowly do 

 changes take place in these districts, that the next 

 summer being rather cold, no alteration was to be 

 noted ; but in 1803 part of the ice between the earth 

 and the monstrous animal was somewhat more melted 

 than before, till the whole at length fell by its own 

 weight on a bank of sand. Next year our fisherman 

 came in the month of March, and cut off the tusks, 

 which he soon sold for about the value of 50 roubles, 

 (about 71. 10s.) Two years after this, in 1806, being 

 the seventh year from the discovery of the carcase, 

 these distant and desert regions were traversed by Mr. 

 Adams, an employe of the Court of Russia ; and his 

 account of the rest of the history of this mammoth, 



