Note 8 — Chapter XLVIII · KAMCHATKA.

Admiral Ricord, a former governor of Kamchatka, imported potatoes for seed, and they were planted, but not taken up the following autumn. The next year, being found abundant and good, they were allowed to remain, where, dying and propagating continually, they yielded more than were locally required. Mr. Hill accounts for the phenomenon by the fact that neither damp nor frost could reach the potatoes; for though in winter the snow covers the surface of the frozen ground, yet so great in this vicinity is the internal volcanic heat that the earth is quite dry, and never frozen below a few inches from the surface.