9 



plished mummy-preparer of Egypt ; and above all most interesting 

 to us because associated with the early history of our race. The 

 huge reptiles of the Secondary Age flourished and passed away 

 unmarked by human eye ; the Deinotherium and (on our side of 

 the world at least) the Mastodon never had the honour of receiving 

 a flint arrow head from the bow of the human hunter. But Paloeo- 

 lithic Man chased the shaggy Mammoth, killed him and ate him ; 

 in fact hastened his extinction, as the men of the iron and steel 

 age are hastening that of his modern representative. 



So familiar are we with it that its very name, Mammoth, 

 l)orrowed from some half-savage tribe in the wilds of Siberia, 

 lias become an English word, and we use it nowadays to describe 

 anything of monstrous size, Mammoth Caves, Mammoth Springs, 

 Mammoth Hippodromes, &c. In representing the forms of reptiles 

 and even of most of the mammals of past ages we have to depend 

 ■on the skill of the Comparative Anatomist, and a little exercise of 

 of the artist's imagination ; but we sketch the mammoth as it has 

 iDeen actually seen. 



The ages which have elapsed since our Chalk formations became 

 'dry land have been divided by geologists into five lesser periods, 

 each numbering probably hundreds oi thousands of years. During 

 the first three of them the climate of the northern parts of the 

 world was tropical or sub-tropical, but during the fourth the 

 temperature was gradually lowered, until at last a period set in, 

 so severe that it is known as the Great Ice Age, or the Glacial 

 Period; — a time when the north and West of England were 

 swathed in ice and snow, and glaciers moved slowly down all 

 our great valleys. Astronomers tell us this cold was greatest 

 about 210,000 years ago, and that it disappeared probably about 

 80,000 years ago, since when the climate has gradually settled 

 into its present condition. Now the Mammoth appears to 

 have been called into existence just before this ice period, and 

 many remains have also been found in inter-glacial deposits, 

 representing milder intervals of a few thousand years, which 

 occasionally prevailed. At the close of the Ice age, however, the 

 Mammoth multiplied exceedingly, but seems always to have 

 favoured a cold climate, for which he was well fitted by his warm 

 covering, not possessed because not required by his modern 

 descendant. Who were his ancestors, how he came here, and 

 where he came from, are questions more easily asked than answered. 

 But he himself is a decidedly tangible creature and it will be in- 

 teresting to follow out (though in bare outline) the steps by which 

 he became the familiar figure he is to the critical and scientific 

 eye of the nineteenth century. 



From very early historical times people were familiar with the 

 occasional occurrence in the soil of huge teeth and bones such as 



