Woolly Mammoth

You would have liked the lecture at the Museum last night, I said to Pliny the Elder this morning.

What was the topic? he asked, looking up from a decrepit-looking diary that I recognised.

Ancient DNA, just your thing, I replied. Or don't you know what that is?

Of course I know what that is, he said. I like to keep up. Tell me all about it.

Well, I said, we went into the foyer with lots of other people, the sort of people you might imagine to be interested in paleontology, and drank 2 glasses of wine on an empty stomach, while looking in glass cases at replicas of fossils, which looked back at us with horrible expressions except in the case of one which appeared to be smiling.

I do not wish to hear this part, said Pliny. Just cut to the lecture, if you please. Although if you had 2 glasses of wine on an empty stomach perhaps you will not make a reliable witness.

I was fine, I said. We went up the wide red-carpetted staircase into the Pacific Cultures gallery and sat down under a suspended plaited straw alligator, near some spears and painted masks. The professor told us that ancient DNA was DNA that has deteriorated. Then he told us about discoveries of caves of moa bones in New Zealand and how a lot could be discovered from ancient moa poo, such as what they used to eat; and that told you a lot about the plants as well.

Fascinating, said Pliny. We used to find giant bones in my day too, and exhibit them as evidence of giants. Some of them were bones of woolly mammoths. Of course we knew that really.

We heard about the woolly mammoths, I said. The research shows that they developed a special type of haemoglobin to stop their ears falling off in the cold.

Hmmmm.... said Pliny. Are you sure you heard that right?