VIII. 
THE FORMATION OF GLACIERS. 
The long summer was over. For ages a trop- 
ical climate had prevailed over a great part of 
the earth, and animals whose home is now be- 
neath the Equator roamed over the world from 
the far South to the very borders of the Arctics. 
The gigantic quadrupeds, the Mastodons, Ele- 
phants, Tigers, Lions, Hyenas, Bears, whose re- 
mains are found in Europe from its southern 
promontories to the northernmost limits of Sibe- 
ria and Scandinavia, and in America from the 
Southern States to Greenland and the Melville 
Islands, may indeed be said to have possessed the 
eai tli in those days. But their reign was over. 
A sudden intense winter, that was also to last for 
ages, fell upon our globe ; it spread over the very 
countries where these tropical animals had their 
homes, and so suddenly did it come upon them 
that they were embalmed beneath masses of snow 
and ice, without time even for the decay which 
follows death. The Elephant whose story was 
told at length in the preceding article was by no 
