360 OBSERVATIONS ON THE MAMMOTH. 



changes the appearances of organized bodies. The fe6r, 

 however, is decifive, as to the principal queftion. It has 

 fummoned the difcordant opinions of philofophers before a Ipi- 

 hijnal, from which there is no appeal. 

 William/burgh, OBober 6th, 1805. 



Fafts by Mr. 

 Nevil on long 

 preferved vege- 

 table bodies. 



Note on the preceding Paper. By the Editor, 



Mr. Francis Nevil, in his account of the elephantine teeth 

 that were difcovered in the north of Ireland, early in the 

 eighteenth century, has mentioned feme facts relative to the 

 Jong prefervation of vegetable matters, which feem worthy 

 of our notice in this place : and the more fo, as this gentle- 

 man's paper feems not to have excited any attention among 

 the modern writers on the exuviae of animals found in coun- 

 tries in which the living animals themfelves are no longer 

 feen. Some extravagant conjectures are mixed with Mr. 

 NeviPs account : but thefe do not, in the lead, invalidate tho 

 truth of what he fays, relative to the bed upon which the 

 Irifii elephant was laid. 



" The place (fays he) where this monfter lay, was thus 

 prepared, which makes me believe it had been buried, or that 

 it had Iain there fmce the deluge. It was about four feet un- 

 der ground, with a little rifing above the (uperficies of the 

 earth, which was a plain under the foot of a hill, and about 

 thirty yards from the brook * or thereabout. The bed whereon 

 it lay had been laid with fern, with that fort of ruflies here 

 called fprits, and with buflies intermixed. Under this was a 

 flifF blue clay on which the teeth and bones were found ; 

 above this was firft a mixture of yellow clay and fand much of 

 the fame colour; under that a fine white fandy clay, which 

 was next to the bed ; the bed was for the mod part a foot 

 thick, and in fome places thicker, with a moifture clear 

 through it; it lay fad and clofe, and cut much like turf, and 

 would divide into flakes, thicker or thinner as you would ; 

 and in every layer the feed of the ruthes was as frefh as if 

 new pulled, fo that it was .in the height of feed-time that thofe 

 bones were laid there. The branches of the fern, in every 



■ hu A fmall brook that parts the couiuies of Cavan and Mo- 

 fcagfiah." 

 '■-■:' la/ 



