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- CHAPTER X.
A SIBERIAN MAMMOTH.
SOME four or five years ago I came across an American illustrated newspaper containing an account of the discovery of a perfect mammoth in Siberia, where it had been imbedded in a glacier for thousands of years. It was stated that an expedition had been sent from St. Petersburg by the Imperial Academy of Sciences, headed by Dr. Herz; also that later a telegram had been received stating the expedition had been successful in se-curing the animal complete, and that all the principal parts, including even part of the contents of the stomach, had been secured and were being brought on sledges overland for thousands of miles. I was intensely interested in the alleged discovery, and made many enquiries of various people to find out if there was any-thing in it more than sensation such as is often got from some of the American papers. The result of my enquiries was very disappointing; most of those I inter-viewed considered it a yarn. I let the matter rest for some time and then decided to write a friend in St. Petersburg for particulars. Mrs. Calthorpe (n?e Dunsmuir), wife of Captain Gough-Calthorpe, who was naval attache to the British Legation at the time, responded in due course of time, sending me a photo (Since lost.?E. F.), reproduced herewith, of the animal as it appeared stuffed in the Imperial Museum, and the promise of a description, which Mr. Norman, secretary of the legation,
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had kindly promised to translate from the Russian for me. This has lately come to hand, and as Mr. Norman states, is rather disappointing?that is, as regards the size of the mammoth, it being a young one. The wonderful part of the story is that the stomach of the mammoth contained food as fresh as the day it was eaten thou-sands of years ago. The food seems to have been young shoots of a species of pine tree, with vegetable matter. The hair on its back was about 13 inches long, with a thick fur at the roots of the hair. I submit the translated account by Mr. Norman, with his letter to me, which I think will be interesting to the many friends of the two British Columbia ladies mentioned therein. I also give an account of the expedition as contained in the newspapers at the time of discovery, as follows :
STORY OF THE SCIENTIFIC EXPEDITION.
" The discovery of the mammoth to which the cable despatch on this page refers, was reported during the summer, and has excited the widest interest in scientific circles.
"A very interesting account of the discovery by Dr. von Adelung, curator of the museum of the Imperial Academy of Sciences at St. Petersburg, has just appeared in the Globus, a leading German scientific paper, of Brunswick.
" From this account it appears that the mammoth was first reported by a Cossack named Jawlowsky. He found it in a glacier near the Beresowka River, a tributary of the Kolyma River, in far Northeastern Siberia. The nearest settlement is Sredne Kolymsk, three hundred versts (a verst is 3,500 yards) away.
" The situation of the body is a very extraordinary
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