MAMMOTHS AXD MASTODONS 115 



the Basel professor may be seen in one of the colleges 

 at Lucerne. 



In England, during the reign of Queen Elizabeth, 

 much excitement was caused by the discovery at 

 Walton of what was supposed to be the body of a 

 giant. A man of the time, writing about this dis- 

 covery, said that the giant's skull would hold five 

 pecks and that every tooth weighed ten ounces ! 

 Then he added that it was plain to see these bones 

 were those of a man and not of a beast. In America, 

 mistakes just as queer were made. Cotton Mather 

 and other well -known men considered the fossil 

 elephant bones found throughout the United States 

 proof that this country was once inhabited by a race 

 of giants. 



When elephant bones were first found in Siberia, 

 the peasants supposed that gigantic animals were 

 living far down in the earth. These animals, so said 

 the peasants, were so strong that, as they traveled 

 about beneath the ground, they dug out deep caves. 

 But they could not live in the air and light of the 

 upper world. Because of this belief, the peasants, 

 when any elephant bones were discovered, thought 



