ctly
preserved that the pupils could be distinctly seen.

In 1771, in the frozen gravelly soil of Wilhuji, in the northern part of
Siberia, an animal was found partially exposed. It was twelve feet in
length; its body was enveloped in a skin which had the thickness and
firmness of sole-leather, but was destitute of folds. Short hair,
strongly planted in the pores of the skin, grew on the face in tufts; it
was rigid in texture, and of a grey hue, with here and there a black
bristle, larger and stiffer than the rest. Short ash-grey hair was
observed to clothe the legs, in moderate profusion. The eyelids and
eyelashes were still visible; the remains of the brain were still in the
cavity of the skull, and the flesh of the body, in a putrefying
condition, was still beneath the skin. On the nose there were
indications of a horn having been seated, around which the integument
had formed a sort of fold.

Thus the creature was known to be a Rhinoceros, and the head and feet
were lifted, and conveyed to St Petersburg, where they are still
preserved in the Imperial Museum. Men of science soon remarked that in
very many points this specimen differed from any species now known; and,
indeed, a hairy rhinoceros was, in itself, an anomaly. Subsequent
investigations have revealed that the same species, known as _Rhinoceros
tichorhinus_, inhabited Siberia in great numbers, and is now extinct.

Nearly thirty years afterwards a still more interesting revelation
occurred. The shores of the Icy Ocean had yielded a vast number of
tusks, not distinguishable from those of the known elephants, and
capable of being worked up by ivory-manufacturers, so that they occupied
a well-recognised place in the commercial markets, and they constitute
to this day the principal supply of the Russian ivory-turners. A
fisherman living at the mouth of the Lena, being one day engaged in
collecting tusks, saw among some ice-blocks an uncouth object. The next
year he observed it still further exposed, and in the following season,
1801, he saw that it was an enormous animal, having great tusks, one of
which, with the entire side of the carcase, projected from the frozen
mass. He knew it to be a _Mammoth_, for so the fossil elephants were
called, and observed it with interest. The next season was so cold that
no change took place; but in 1803, the melting of the ice proceeded so
far that the gigantic animal fell down from the cliff entire, and was
deposited on the