PRESERVATION OF MAMMOTHS IN SIBERIA. i 379 
herd had comprised the whole species then living, the reindeer would 
now be extinct. 
PRESERVATION OF THE FLEsH oF MAmMMorHs IN SIBERIA 
~The preservation till the present day of the flesh of some of the naam- 
moths which perished in the region about the mouth of the Lena river 
and elsewhere proves that the carcasses must have become frozen imme- 
diately after death, and this circumstance may be accounted for in the 
following way: If the last of these creatures succumbed in the manner 
supposed, there may have been at that time a series of unusually cold 
years, aS sometimes happens in high latitudes, and this, together with 
the increasing severity of the climate in general] ever since, would ac- 
count for the preservation of some of their carcasses in the snow and ice 
which have persisted in that region till the present time. 
The occurrence of large numbers of the remains of mammoths in the 
alluvial deposits about the mouth of the Lena and other rivers may be 
explained by the supposition that the animals had broken through the 
too thin ice in attempting to cross the streams upon it on their south- 
ward migration in the autumn, and that their bodies had subsequently 
floated down to the still water. Indeed, it is highly probable that whole 
herds of these animals lost their lives in this manner. While the bison 
was abundant in our northwest territories it was a matter of common 
occurrence for large numbers of them to be drowned when attempting to 
eross the streams in compact droves before the ice was strong enough to 
bear the strain. The great abundance of bison bones in some of the 
fluviatile deposits in this region is easily accounted for in this way. 
The mammoths, owing to their great, weight, would be still more liable 
to such anaccident. Professor Richard Lydekker, in ‘“‘ The Royal Nat- 
ural History,” lately published, speaking of the trade in ivory from 
Siberia, says that within a recent period, covering twenty years, 20,000 
mammoths must have been discovered in that region. 
: IMPROBABLE THEORIES 
The supposition that the mammoths of northern Siberia were frozen 
where we find them by a sudden change from a warm to a very cold 
climate, and which has remained permanently so, is as untenable as the 
other theory, which supposes the bones and tusks found there to be those 
of mammoths which were drowned in great numbers and at the same 
time within a limited area by a sudden cataclysm. If it were possible 
(which it is not) that such an abrupt change of climate could happen, it 
would require to be general around a great part of the globe, and there 
