494 H. H. Howorth—The Mammoth in Siberia. 
others from Sredne Kolymsk to Yakutsk. At Alaseisk, a small 
station on the river Alaseya, about 100 versts down the river, and in 
its sandy banks, he was told there was the body of an animal of the 
size of an elephant. It was still whole and covered with its hide, 
and here and there had long hair on it. Sarytschef unfortunately 
did not visit the spot, which was a good deal out of his way. 
About the same time, or even earlier, a Mammoth covered with 
hair was found at the mouth of the Lena, for when Adams’ specimen 
was discovered, the Tungus told him that their fathers had told 
them that one of their number had seen a similar animal, and had 
then immediately died with all his family. The new discovery he 
deemed an evil omen, and fell ill. 
In 1805, when Tilesius was on his way to Kamstkatka with 
Krusenstern’s expedition, he was told by Patapof, who was carrying 
provisions from Okhotsk, that he had a short time before seen a 
Mammoth with a hairy skin, on the shore of the Polar Sea, and as 
evidence he sent Tilesius a bunch of its hair, which he in turn sent 
on to Blumenbach. Adams speaks of another similar find two 
years before his own discovery on the banks of the Lena a long way 
from the sea. 
We now arrive at the famous Mammoth with which the name 
of Adams is so associated. Adams was a botanist, who was at 
Yakutsk in 1806, when he heard that a Mammoth with its flesh, 
skin, and hair intact, had been found on a peninsula at the mouth of 
the Lena. On going there he learnt that a Tungus chief named 
Ossip Schumakhof, in a journey to the borders of the peninsula of 
Tamut in 1799, saw a hummock or lumpy hill. In 1801 this had 
melted away partially and disclosed the side of a large animal with 
a tusk projecting out. The following summer proved a very cold 
one and the animal melted very little. In 1803, the ice between it 
and the cliff melted, and it subsided on to a bank of sand lower 
down. In March, 1804, Schumakhof returned to the Mammoth, 
detached its tusks, and bartered them for goods of the value of 50 
roubles. The Tungus drew a picture of the animal, which Adams 
said was very incorrect. It had pointed ears, very small eyes, feet 
like a Horse, and a line of bristles along the back, and looked like a 
cross between a Pig and an Hlephant. The merchant Boltunof, who 
saw the carcase in 1803, before it had decayed, mentions that it 
had a long snout between its tusks (i.e. a trunk). Adams did not 
see it till 1806. In the meantime the dogs of the Yakuts and the 
wild animals had eaten its flesh, and Adams found little more than the 
skeleton, of which one of the fore-limbs was lost. The bones were 
still united by thin ligaments, the skin on the head was dried up, 
and a bunch of hair remained on one ear. In the left eye he 
thought he could distinguish the pupil. 
The skin of the side on which the animal had lain was still 
covered with thick hair. Adams secured a portion of this hide, which 
was so heavy that ten men with difficulty dragged it on to the bank. 
He also collected a pood of long hair, which lay scattered about the 
ground round about. These remains are still in the Zoological 
