§ 19. MAMMOTHS OF SIBERIA. 153 



The tusks are curved forward and upward. The teeth 

 differ from those of the two living species of Elephants, 

 in the disposition of the plates of dentine (see p. 142), 

 and also in their internal microscopic structure ; the 

 configuration of the skull is likewise peculiar ; and these 

 discrepancies, together with the hairy and woolly skin, led 

 Baron Cuvier to consider the species as having been adapted 

 to exist in a colder climate than the living types. But 

 that eminent philosopher also assumed, from the preserva- 

 tion of the bodies of these animals in ice, and the present 

 low temperature and sterile condition of that part of Siberia 

 where these remains abound, that a sudden change of 

 climate had taken place, and continued, by which the race 

 was destroyed, and entombed in the frozen soil. 



Playfair, with that profound sagacity which characterized 

 all his speculations on geological phenomena, first suggested 

 the idea, "that the power of living in a different climate, 

 and of enduring greater degrees of heat or of cold, and of 

 subsisting on a different kind of food/' may have be- 

 longed to the extinct Elephants found in Siberia ; " for 

 though one species," he remarks, " may now be confined to 

 the southern parts of Asia, another may have been able to 

 endure the severe climates of the north : and the same may 

 be true of the rhinoceros, buffalo, &c. These animals 

 may have lived farther to the south than where their 

 remains are actually found, among the valleys between the 

 great ranges of mountains that bound Siberia on that side. 

 We must observe, too, that they may have migrated with 

 the seasons, and by that means avoided the rigorous winters 

 of the high latitudes."* And more recently, Mr. Lyell, 

 extending these views, suggested that a large region of 

 Central Asia, perhaps the southern half of Siberia, might, 

 during the Mammoth period, have possessed a climate mild 



- Playfair's Illustrations of the Huttonian Theory, Edinburgh edi- 

 tion of 1822, vol. i. p. i65. Dr. Fleming also supported these views. 



