1884.] Recent Literature, 1021 
country full of lakes, swamps, and rivers, a dead flat in some 
places, in others undulating, even hilly. This was the true Sibe- 
rian tundra, brilliant with flowers, swarming with mosquitos, and 
full of birds. In sheltered places, dwarf willows and weeping 
birch were growing, and (we were only some fifty versts from the 
forests) here and there a few stunted larches., Winding through 
the tundra was the track of what had once been the bed of a 
river, nothing now but a small deep valley forming a chain of iso- 
lated lakesand pools. * * On some of the northern slopes, 
large patches of snow were still lying.” 
“The history of animal and vegetable life on the tundra is a 
very curious one. For eight months out of the twelve every trace 
of vegetable life is completely hidden under a blanket, six feet 
thick, of snow, which effectually covers every plant and bush— 
trees there are none to hide. During six months of this time at 
least, animal life is only traceable by the footprints of a reindeer 
or a fox on the snow, or by the occasional appearance of a raven 
or a snowy owl, wandering above the limits of forest growth, 
where it has retired for the winter. * * * Then comes the 
south wind, and often rain, and the great event of the year takes 
place; the ice in the great rivers breaks up, and the blanket of 
snow melts away. The black earth absorbs the heat of the never- » 
setting sun; quietly but swiftly vegetable life awakes from its long 
sleep, and for three months a hot summer produces a brilliant al- 
pine flora, like an English flower garden run wild, and a profusion 
of alpine fruit, diversified only by storms from the north, which 
Sometimes for a day or two bring cold and rain down from the 
Arctic ice. 
That the tundra is the former bottom of the Arctic ocean 
seems to us to be proved by the shallowness of the Arctic sea 
north of Siberia as shown by Nordenskidld’s map, also by the 
Presence of hills of shells found by Seebohm, at least 500 feet 
above the sea, belonging to species still living in the Arctic 
ocean, the fossils occurring near or in a bluish, sandy clay. Space 
18 not left us to speak of Seebohm’s discoveries regarding the 
migrations of birds in Siberia, and the new facts he discovered re- 
garding their hybridity and nesting habits. The volume will sup- 
plement Nordenskidld’s narrative. 
Wiscuett’s Wortp-Lirz}—The mode of formation, growth 
nd decay of the worlds that people the universe is the loftiest 
theme upon which the human mind can exercise itself, but from 
its very loftiness is one upon which, as Professor Winchell would 
himself be one of the first to admit, certain knowledge has not yet 
been attained. When rival theories dispute for precedence, or 
1 World.Li : EXANDER WINCHELL, LL.D., Pro- 
tear of Geology and Paan ia the University of Michigan. Chicago, S. 
* Srggs & Co., 1883. 
