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The highest point of Etna, near the sea, is 11,000 feet. Its principal structure is volcanick matter, the base of the cone measuring eighty-seven miles in circumference; and the fields of lava extend to twice this distance, cultivated and populous. Numerous minor cones are seen at different points; and the chief cone has fallen in frequently. From the earliest traditionary eras, Etna has been active.

The next important volcanick region is Iceland. Heela has been subject to unceasing eruptions six years consecutively. New islands have been cast up, and hills thrown down; floods of lava, have inundated the country; and numerous hot springs have burst forth in various directions.

by showers of lighter alluvial matter. Herculaneumed up, "and towers toppled on their warders' heads." was discovered, very differently situated, in digging a Mountains have been laid low, and hills raised, and well, in the year 1713, when they came down at once islands have appeared and disappeared suddenly. upon the theatre in which the statues of Hercules and Houses have been known to be affected with a vertical Cleopatra were found, both cities having originated movement, and transported to distant spots. In 1829, with Grecian colonists, and long continued the most the city of Murcia, in the south of Spain, suffered dreadflourishing of Campania. Pompeii was found to meas- fully from a shock on the 21st of March. So did Boure three miles in circumference, but that of Hercula-gota, on the 16th of November, 1817; and Chili, on neum is uncertain; and this city appears to have been the 19th of November, 1822; and the shock extended the only one destroyed by melted lava. twelve hundred miles from north to south, injuring many towns, and filling up rivers. In 1822, Aleppo was destroyed. From the 15th of February to the 16th of March, in 1820, the Ionian Islands were convulsed. In April 1815, the islands of Sumbawa experienced a shock, which was felt seventy miles in a direct line, accompanied by whirlwinds and other atmospherick phenomena, and the explosion was heard in Sumatra, nine hundred miles distant. In 1811, South Carolina experienced great changes of level. Lakes and islands were created in the valley of the Mississippi. The Aleutian Islands were disturbed in 1806 and 1814, and new rocks appeared above the waters. The whole coast of Chili has been permanently raised. Shallow channels have been rendered navigable; and the town of Tomboro, with twelve thousand persons was submerged. These are a few only of the numerous catastrophes on record, but which alone are sufficient to convince any reasonable being that our planet has not as yet settled down into a state of permanent repose and inactivity. Who has not heard or read of the Caraçcas, Sicily, Java, Chili, Calabria, &c., associated with earthquakes in our own time! And if we go back a little farther, we find these and other volcanick countries periodically disturbed. Who can forget the affecting narrative of that most tremendous explosion which shook Lisbon to the ground, in 1755, upon the 1st of November, when sixty thousand persons were destroyed in the short space of six minutes; and the sea, after retiring, and laying the mouth of the Tagus dry, rolled suddenly and impetuously back, rising to the height of fifty feet. The scene must have been grand and appalling, and such as is so forcibly described in the Scriptures to have immediately followed the crucifixion. Surrounding mountains were rent asunder, and flames of fire and thick clouds of smoke burst forth on all sides from the heaving earth. The splendid new marble quay was sunk, and a great number of boats were overwhelmed. The most sensible movements were felt in Spain, Portugal and Northern Africa; but nearly all Europe recognised some shock, which was extended even to the West Indies. A sea-port town called St. Eudal's twenty miles south of Lisbon was engulfed. A village near Morocco was swallowed up. A wave sixty feet high, at Cadiz, found an entrance there, and swept the coast of Spain. At Tangiers the waters alternately rose and fell eighteen times. At Funchal the sea rose fifteen feet above high-water mark. At Kinsale, in Ireland, the sea entered a port, and rolled with irresistible force round the marketplace. The lake of Lochlomond in Scotland also rose,

From the discovery of the new world till June 1759, Jorrullo was in repose. It stands upon a plateau, two or three thousand feet above the level of the sea, six hundred feet high, bounded by hills of basalt, trachyte, and volcanick tuffa, with six volcanoes of scoria, and fragments of lava round it. Among the Canary isles are evidences of the renewal of the fires of a central crater, and the almost entire cessation of a series of irregular eruptions from lesser independent cones, the great habitual vent being nearly filled up, eruptions still going on, and new cones and craters forming every day; showing that the forces thus in operation converge in some volcanick archipelago when the central cone is inactive.

Modern lavas are nearly one-half composed of felspar, and when in great excess the mass is trachytick; and when augite predominates, basaltick. In the granitick and other ancient rocks there is an abundance of quartz, usually referred to igneous action; whereas quartz is merely silex crystallized, and is rarely found in modern lavas. Horne-blende is also equally rare in modern, though commonly found in ancient lavas.

Within the last century the great five European volcanoes of Vesuvius, Etna, Volcano, Sauterin, and Iceland, appear to have experienced fifty recorded eruptions, independently of many which have escaped notice, from occurring in the Grecian Sea, and the neighbourhood of Iceland, as submarine convulsions. So many indeed have thus passed off, that it is calculated at most, that the active volcanoes constitute one fortieth only of those which have taken place upon the entire globe. The general calculation of the numbers of eruptions is two thousand every century, or twenty per annum.

Earthquakes exhibit premonitory signs in the atmosphere, which are well known to observers in volcanick regions. The seasons are usually irregular previous to St. Domingo, Conception, and Peru, are associated such phenomena, and are accompanied with sudden with still more devastating circumstances; and the gusts of wind and dead calms, unusual and violent total loss of Lima, at earlier periods. Jamaica suffered rains, the sun's disk putting on a fiery redness, hazi- dreadful havock, as did Teneriffe, Java, Quito, Sicily, ness of the air, bodies of inflammable gas from electri- and the Moluccas, in the seventeenth and eighteenth cal matter, sulphureous or mephitick vapours, subterra- centuries, within a period of one hundred and forty nean noises like the rolling of carriages, thunder, or years. But there can be no doubt of the recorded caartillery; animals every where appear alarmed in-tastrophes not being all which have occurred. Many stinctively, and utter cries; and people feel dizzy, and have probably not been known from their wrecks as if sea-sick. During the last hundred and fifty years, having eluded search. earthquakes have produced great changes upon the The relative levels of land and sea have frequently globe, and the devastations made by them have been changed from the shocks of earthquakes in many attended with great loss of human life and property. places, as buildings, such as ancient temples, &c., on Casualties on a great scale have been common; lakes the coast indicate, when their present is compared have appeared where dry ground previously existed, with their former traditional state-pillars being forand rivers have risen and overwhelmed every thing for merly hid which are now above water, and some immiles around. Villages and cities have been swallow-mersed which were built on dry land, together with

other traces of the advance or receding of the sea. | precipitated. The inhabitants of Bronti, about fifteen These appearances have originated much controversy in attempting to draw geological inferences; but it is justly considered that, as the ocean maintains a permanent level, such indications show the coast land to have been verging at different periods, or subsiding and becoming elevated alternately.

The physical history of the globe is much illustrated by the various changes which have occurred on its surface from earthquakes, not merely during the last century, but anciently. Former states of the earth, not being usually considered as capable of explanation from causes now in operation, have been left more to conjecture than those solid proofs which we recognise by an appeal to modern phenomena. Nor are the successive changes from subterranean movements less in the interiour than upon the crust of the earth; the former, indeed, indicate a much greater degree of commotion in the terrestrial abysses than above.

miles from the base of the mountain, were kept some time in the utmost terrour and suspense, from a river of burning lava, which gradually approached their city. Many fled in despair, and those who remained were in hourly expectation of the fate of Herculaneum. A canal was hastily dug and walled in; and the last ac counts stated, that Bronti was secured from the threat ened inundation of the fiery flood when it approached within about a quarter of a mile of the town:-the course of the devouring fluid having been successfully diverted.-Frazer's Mag.

INTEMPERANCE.

The following fact, as related by Prof. Sewall is a serious warning to men who drink ardent spirits.

"A man was taken up dead in the streets of London, after having drank a great quantity of gin on a wager. He was carried to Westminster Hospital and there dissected. In the ventricles of the brain, was found a considerable quantity of limpid fluid, impregnated with gin, both to the sense of smell and taste, and even to the test of inflammability. The liquid appeared to the senses of the examining students as strong as one-third gin and two-thirds water."

AUTUMN.-BY W. C. BAYANT.

The subterranean regions are evidently subject to peculiar chymical and mechanical changes. Long series of internal convulsions have thrown up deposites several miles above the level of the ocean which have been formerly below its bottom. Many rocks now appear jutting out of the sea, which once lay several miles deep beneath. The sources of all volcanick fire must What strange infatuation is it that tempts men to be always very deep; and before this fact was known, drink alcoholick liquors, when facts, and reason, and igneous phenomena were referred to atmospherick ope- nature and religion, are continually warning them of the rations. We are indeed taught to consider the occa- inevitable train of disasters and evils consequent theresional obstructions to the draining of a country, the on! When our senses warn us of the immediate dancreation of lakes and pools from subsidences or land-ger of a precipice close at hand, have we not prudence slips, and the conversion of shallow waters into rain to avoid it, clinging to life as we do with a cowardly by evaporation, whirlwinds and other atmospherick tenacity? And when physicians demonstrate to us phenomena, to proceed from the same sources as those the poisonous, deadly influence of ardent spirits upon from which volcanick phenomena arise. In most in- the system, and all experience illustrates the truth, stances of volcanoes, they are either close to the sea, why have not men sense and consistency enough to or have some direct communication with it. Hence it forsake the miserably foolish indulgence of drinking is more than probable that the igneous changes are con- the poison. No rational man, who could once feel nected with hydrostatick pressure. The percolation of sensible of the delights of temperance, would unless water through the earth affords sufficient steam for the by an infatuation as gross as insanity ever be tempted most violent earthquakes, and in all cases of explosions into its opposite. And no individual who can in truth steam is necessarily produced. During an eruption, profess to be virtuous or patriotick, can consistently an exhalation of aqueous vapour, muriatick acid, sulphur, with that profession, ever give countenance to intemwith hydrogen or oxygen, carbonick acid and nitrogen, perance in others, by the contagious influence of his occurs from the decomposition of salt water. And own example. thus we perceive the co-operation of fire and water in raising lava to the surface, below which there are always enormous masses of matter in a constant state of fusion, as we see for ages steam has been emitted from inactive volcanoes at a temperature above the boiling point. Reviewing the history of earthquakes and volcanoes, derived from the records of catastrophes attending them, and the geological evidences and illustrations afforded by modern science, we may conclude, in the words of Mr. Lyell, that "as to the agency of the subterranean movements, the constant repair of dry land, and the subserviency of our planet to the support of terrestrial as well as aquatick species, are secured by the elevating and depressing power of the earthquakes. And that this cause, so often the source of death and terrour to the inhabitants of the globe, which visits in succession every zone and fills the earth with monuments of ruin and disorder, is, nevertheless, a conservative principle in the highest degree, and above all others essential to the stability of the system." An eruption of great magnitude has recently occurred And now when comes the calm mild day-as still such days will threatening the destruction of Bronti. The appearance of a fiery column, extending to a great height, and To call the squirrel and the bee from out their winter home; When the sound of dropping nuts is heard, though all the trees forming a beautiful arch, and to which was added a are still, blue pillar (arising from sulphureous matter) is de- And twinkle in the smoky light the waters of the rill, scribed in letters from the island. But it appears to be The south wind searches for the flowers whose fragrance late generally admitted, that the arched column itself is the And sighs to find them in the wood and by the stream no more. effect of reflection from the impending clouds above, And then I think of one who in her youthful beauty died, since no hydrogen has been recognised as emitted from The fair meek blossom that grew up and faded by my side. the crater, and since, if the phenomena arose from the In the cold moist earth we laid her, when the forest cast the leaf, combustion of such an inflammable gas in the atmos-Yet not unmeet it was that one, like that young friend of ours, And we wept that one so lovely should have a lot so brief! phere, no small shower of rain would be simultaneously So gentle and so beautiful, should perish with the flowers.

The melancholy days are come, the saddest of the year,
Of wailing winds and naked wood, and meadows brown and sere,
Heap'd in the hollows of the grove the withered leaves lie dead.
They rustle to the eddying gust and to the rabbit's tread.
The robin and the wren are flown, and from the shrubs the jay,
And from the wood-top calls the crow, through all the gloomy
day.
Where are the flowers, the fair young flowers, that lately sprung
In brighter light and softer airs, a beauteous sisterhood?
and stood,
Alas! they all are in their graves the gentle race of flowers
Are lying in their gentle beds, with the fair and good of ours:
The rain is falling where they lie-but the cold November ram
Calls not from out the gloomy earth the lovely ones again.
The windflower and the violet, they perish'd long ago;
And the brier-rose and the orchis died, amid the summer glow
But on the hill the golden rod, and the aster in the wood,
And the yellow sunflower by the brook in autumn beauty stood,
Till fell the frost from the clear cold heaven, as falls the plague on
And the brightness of their smile was gone from upland glade and
glen.

men,

come,

he bore,

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THE INDIAN BOA.

The serpents form a division of the reptile class too well known by their elongated scaly bodies, and their total deprivation of external members, to require any minute description of their organization. They are also held by the generality of mankind in so much abhorrence, and regarded for the most part with such strong feelings of unmitigated disgust, that we feel but little inclined to dwell upon their history, how much soever they may on many accounts be considered as deserving of a more extended notice.

They are frequently divided into two great sections; the one, which is by far the most numerous, comprehending all those in which the poison-fangs are wanting, and which are consequently dangerous only in proportion to the extent of their muscular force; and the other consisting of those in which the fangs are present, and the bite of which is accompanied with the pouring out of a venomous secretion. At the head of the first of these divisions rank the Boas, which in the Linnean arrangement comprehend all those snakes, whether venomous or not, whose under surface was covered with narrow transverse plates, and whose tail was destitute of rattle. Later zoologists have, how ever, confined that appellation to those among the Lin

nean Boas, which are without poisonous fangs and have claws near the vent, and have regarded as a distinct genus the snakes which in addition to these latter characters have the scales of the under surface of the tail so arranged as to form two distinct rows. To the latter, which inhabit the Old Continent exclusively (while the former are all of them natives of America,) they have assigned the name of Python.

The present species, which is commonly exhibited under the popular but erroneous title of the Boa Constrictor, appears to be the Pedda Poda of Dr. Russel's Indian Serpents. It is said by that writer to attain a length of eight or ten feet; but living specimens have been brought to England of twice that size, and some of those now in the Tower are fifteen or sixteen feet long. The number of transverse plates on the under surface of the body is stated to be two hundred and fifty-two, and that of the pairs of scales beneath the tail sixty-two. The back is elegantly marked with a series of large irregular black blotches bordered with black; and numerous smaller spots are scattered along The ground colour is yellowish brown, the sides. lighter beneath. The extent of muscular power which these serpents

possess in common with the Boas is truly wonderful. | of nature; but when we have the evidence even in To the smaller amon them the lesser quadrupeds and our own soil of the primeval existence of monsters at even birds fall an easy prey; bu: the larger, when ex- least four times larger than the largest animals that at cited by the stimulus of hunger, are capable of crush-present inhabit the land, we cannot consistently reject ing within their spiral folds the largest and most pow-the statement of the before mentioned book. Bones erful of beasts. The sturdy buffalo and the agile stag of lizards have been rescued from the soil of the westbecome alike the victims of their fatal embrace; and ern states, which must have been according to Mr. the bulk of these animals presents but little obstacle to Flint at least eighty feet long! Does it seem improbtheir being swallowed entire by the tremendous reptile, able therefore, with such analogy before us, that a spewhich crushes them as it were into a mass, lubricates cies of the Boa one hundred and twenty feet long could them with the fetid mucus secreted in its stomach, and have existed in Africa or India in the days of monthen slowly distending its jaws and œsophagus to an sters? Other things being equal, there is no reason extent proportioned to the magnitude of the object to why we should discredit the statement. be devoured, and frequently exceeding by many times. its own previous size, swallows it by one gradual and long-continued effort.

Of the mode in which this operation is effected, a detailed description is contained in MacLeod's Voyage of His Majesty's ship Alceste; and an excellent account has been subsequently given by Mr. Broderip in the second volume of the Zoological Journal from actual observation of the specimens now in the Tower. The vivid description of the latter almost brings before the reader's eye the lightning dash of the serpent; the single scream of its instantly enfolded victim, whose heaving flanks proclaimed that it still breathed; and its last desperate effort, succeeded by the application of another and a deadly coil. With equal force and fidelity it sketches the continuation of the scene, when the serpent, after slowly disengaging his folds placed his head opposite to that of his victim, coiled himself once more around it to compress it into the narrowest possible compass, and then gradually propelled it into his separated jaws and dilated throat; and finally presents a disgusting picture of the snake when his meal was at an end, with his loose and apparently dislocated jaws, dropping with the superfluous mucus which had been poured forth.

In a book published in London some years ago, called Curiosities of Nature and Art, there is an account of this animal which would at first view seem to be altogether fabulous. The book says:

"It was, in all probability, an enormous specimen of this very serpent which once threw a whole Roman army into dismay. The fact is recorded by Valerius Maximus, who quotes it from one of the lost books of Livy, where it was detailed at a greater length. He relates that, near the river Bagrada, in Africa, a snake was seen of so enormous a magnitude, as to prevent the army of Attilius Regulus from the use of the river; and which, after having snatched up several soldiers with its enormous mouth, and killed several others by striking and squeezing them with the spires of its tail, was at length destroyed by assailing it with all the force of military engines, and showers of stones, after it had withstood the attack of their spears and darts. It was regarded by the whole army as a more formidable enemy than even Carthage itself. The whole adjacent region was tainted with the pestilential effluvia proceeding from its remains, as were the waters with its blood, so as to oblige the Roman army to shift its station. The skin of this monster, measuring in length one hundred and twenty feet, was sent to Rome as a trophy, and was there suspended in a temple, where it remained till the time of the Numidian war."

We cannot positively assert this to be untrue; but were such an account given of the appearance of a similar monster in modern times it would be difficult to find credulity enough to admit even the possibility of its being true, unless it partook of the nature of the Sea-Serpent of Massachusetts Bay, and lived in the water, the element above all others most prolifiek in monsters. But after all there are as many reasons favouring the belief that such a tremendous serpent existed in older days, as there are to disbelieve it. It is natural to suppose that the superstition of those days would exaggerate every slight discrepancy in the order

The engraving at the head of this article represents this tremendous serpent, and the manner in which the natives skin them. They tie a rope around the neck, and suspend the snake to the limb of a tree: they then climb to the limb, cut the skin around the neck, and embracing the serpent at that point allow themselves to slide down the monster's length, bringing the skin with them. These serpents are natives of the East Indies.

THE VICISSITUDES OF LIFE.

The editor of a new paper called the Mechanick's Banner, recently commenced at Baltimore, meets with a multitude of perplexities at the very outset of his career, which gives occasion for the production of the following true picture.

The clergyman, as he weeps over his stubborn flock, and sees them in spite of his prayers and entreaties pursuing "the errour of their way," exclaims, "surely none have difficulties like the minister;" and the physician, as he rouses from his midnight sleep to encounter the chilling winds of winter, and comes shivering to the bedside of his patient, rubs his thumb over his lancet, and says, "would that I had never been a doctor." The farmer, as he tills his land, from the rising of the sun until the going down of the same, "sowing his seed in the morning, and on the evening withholding not his hand," stands kimbo upon some sun-parched field, and as he views the scorched grain and withered grass, bending their tops to the burning soil, with a smileless lip he says, "wo is me, for my troubles are past endurance;" and the slave, as he lifts his hand from the spade that is worn smooth by his grasp, raises his fettered arm towards the heavens, and execrates the light that hails him to his toil. The politician pores for years over some splendid scheme, and fancies the day not far distant when he shall fill to the brim the measure of his own with his country's glory; he starts as the tide of publick opinion comes rolling against him, resistless as the Simoon of the sandy desert, and the dying away of the winds bears his moan upon their bosom-" vain and vexatious are the pursuits of the statesman." The lawyer ransacks the musty doings of past ages-studies hard and long to effect the overthrow of his opponent, piles up and pulls down, and turns over and over again the pages of innumerable volumes, speeds his way, loaded with books to the court room, contemplates his success, and already fancies his name to be recorded upon the highest Collocate upon the column of fame. He lifts his voice amid the learned assembly, and the plaudits of the admiring multitude cheer him onward. He submits his case to the jury, and retires from the court flushed with satisfaction, and blushing beneath the high honours of his auditory; he seeks his client, and tells him to rejoice, and like a hero returning from his victory with the laurel of triumph upon his fevered brow, he enjoys a momentary glow of exalted pleasure; but, alas for him, the return of the jury reverse the verdict his own imagination has conceived, and he hates the hour he was born. The merchant tarries till the breaking of the day at his gas light desk, and counts and calculates with a sleepless age, and an

anxious heart; thousands are his due, but they are held by his fellow-men; he fondly believes it all secure, and exults in the expectation of happiness; one failure, and another, and another take place; he denounces the whole human race, and in the moments of his distress reflects upon all the world of men as scoundrels but himself.

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the globe; and many as in the case of the fossil elephant, belonged to a species not at present met with in any part of the known world. The professor of Geology at Oxford, Dr. Buckland was requested to examine the collection brought home by Captain Beechey, and to prepare a description of them.

The warriour, as he rushes to the crimson plain, covers his course with the bodies of the dead, and as he sinks with the steel in his heart, his last cry is "the soldier's career is attended with doubt, danger, and difficulty, and his reward is death." The sailor springs from his hammock slumbers, and as he mounts the yards, in the solitary watch of the night, mingles with his "yo heave" a curse upon the difficulties of life. The mechanick toils from sun to sun, and as he returns from the monotony of his daily avocation, he ponders over his oppressed situation, his home, his wife, his children, all gather about his heart; the feelings of his nature rive him to the quick, and he fain would lift his arm and cry, these things shall not be, but finds it fettered, and his free-born soul is goaded by the scorpion sting of imposition, as he bends his neck again to his slavish toil. But the printer, the poor printer-who shall begin to sum up the amount of his difficulties? Human language and human effort are inadequate, and human calculation, with all its catalogue of human woes, reach not the deep recess where spring the printer's difficulties. The tears of the clergyman, the shivering of the physician, the fears of the farmer, the distresses of the slave, the failures of the politician, the mortifications of the merchant, the despair of the conquered soldier, the woes of the sailor, and the mechanick's bitter reflections-all, all, and a myriad more, harrow the printer's heart. The calendar of human evil, like the solar sun, sends its converging rays, and all concentrate upon the printer's head. The printer must hear every thing, feel every thing, see every thing, know every thing, and tell it in the right time, or he knows nothing about his business; he must be a very Proteus in every sense of the word; his calvarium must be marked by every bump in Gall and Spurzhein, and then he will do well to prepare himself for abuse and fault-finding. We have said all of the above, courteous reader, by way of apology for the long delay of the second number of our paper; and if we have not said enough, may the shades of Charon help us, for we had better gather up our spoils and prepare for a journey across the Stygian Lake. We are inclined to think that we will never commit the sin of getting up another paper. We saw difficulties in the commencement, and prepared to surmount them; but the strained imaginations of the most untramelled poet never conceived, in his boldest flight, the Alpha of our troubles: what the Omega shall be, time must

write.

THE MAMMOTH OF THE NORTH.

Professor Buckland compares the accounts brought home by these voyagers, (especially that of Mr. Collie, lar discoveries by other writers, and with the result of surgeon to the expedition) with the description of simihis own researches and observations. He thus endeavours to throw "some light upon the curious and perplexing question, as to what was the climate of this by animals now so foreign to it as the elephant and rhiportion of the world at the time when it was inhabited noceros; and as to the manner in which not only their but in some remarkable instances, the entire carcasses teeth and tusks, and other portions of their skeletons, of these beasts, with their flesh and skin still perfect, became entombed in ice, or in frozen mud and gravel, over such extensive and distant regions of the north." It is stated by the celebrated naturalist, Pallas, that throughout the whole of northern Asia, from the river Don to the extreme point nearest America, there is scarcely any great river in whose banks they do not find the bones of elephants and other large animals, which cannot now endure the climate of the district; and that all the fossil ivory collected for sale throughout Siberia, is found in the lofty, steep and sandy banks of the rivers of that country; and that the bones of large and small animals lie in some places piled together in great heaps; but in general they are scattered separately, as if they had been agitated by waters, and buried in mud and gravel.

When Captain Beechey returned to England after his voyage to the Pacific Ocean, he carried home a large quantity of the petrified or stone remains of elephants and other animals, which were found imbedded in the cliffs of frozen mud within Behring's Strait, and in various parts of the Northern Seas. The most perfect specimens of these remarkable fossils as they are called, are preserved in the British Museum.

That these remains formed parts of animals once living on this earth, no one can doubt. But on examining these bones, various difficulties present themselves, requiring much patience and extensive knowledge satisfactorily to remove. There is one circumstance connected with them which has especially engaged the thoughts of the learned: the animals of which many of these bones were the remains, are never found in our days alive in those cold regions of the north, but are natives of the south or tropical parts of

The term "Mammoth" has been applied indiscriminately to all the largest species of fossil animals. It is a word from the Tartar language, and means simply "Animal of the Earth." It is now used only to signify the fossil elephant. Of all the remains that have ever been discovered, the most remarkable is the entire carcass of a Mammoth, not petrified but merely frozen, with its flesh, skin, and hair, fresh and well preserved. How many thousand years it might have so kept from corruption in its icy coffin, it is impossible to say. In the year 1803 it fell from a frozen cliff in Siberia, near the mouth of the river Lena. Nearly five years elapsed. between the period when the carcass was first observed by a Tungusian in the thawing cliff, in 1799, and the moment when it became entirely loosened and fell down upon the strand between the shore and the base of the cliff. Here it lay two more years, till the greater part of the flesh was devoured by wolves and bears. The skeleton was then collected by Mr. Adams, and sent to Petersburgh. Some idea may be formed of the size of this enormous animal, from the fact that the head without the tusks, weighed four hundred and fourteen pounds; the tusks together weighed three hundred and sixty pounds. Great part of the skin of the body

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