SICILIAN CAVES. 317 



with these bones, and, according to all appearance, of the 

 same antiquity. They occurred at various depths, from ten 

 inches to eleven feet, and some of them were in the gravel, 

 below the wiiole of the ochreous cave-earth. 



Again, in the grotto of Maccagnone, in Sicily, Dr. Falconer 

 found human traces, consisting of ashes and rude flint imple- 

 ments, in a breccia containing bones of the Elephas antiquus, 

 of the hysena, of a large Ursus, of a Felis (probably F. spelcea), 

 and especially with large numbers of bones belonging to the 

 hippopotamus. The " ceneri impastati," or concrete of ashes, 

 had at one time filled the cavern, and a large piece of bone 

 breccia was still cemented to the roof, but owing to some 

 change in the drainage, the greater part had been washed out 

 again. The presence of the hippopotamus sufficiently proves 

 that the geographical conditions of the country must have 

 been very different from what they are now ; but I cannot do 

 better than quote Dr. Falconer's own summary of his obser- 

 vations in this case : 



" The vast number of Hippopotami implied that the physical 

 condition of the country must have been greatly different, at 

 no very distant geological period, from what obtains now. 

 He considered that all deposits above the bone breccia had 

 been accumulated up to the roof by materials washed in from 

 above, through sinuous crevices or flues in the limestone, and 

 that the uppermost layer, consisting of the breccia of shells, 

 bone-splinters, siliceous objects, burnt clay, bits of charcoal, 

 and hysena coprolites, had been cemented to the roof by 

 stalagmitic infiltration. The entire condition of the large 

 fragile Helices proved that the effect had been produced by 

 the tranquil agency of water, as distinct from any tumultuous 

 action. There was nothing to indicate that the different 

 objects in the roof breccia were other than of contemporaneous 

 origin : subsequently a great physical alteration in the con- 

 tour, altering the flow of superficial water and of the subter- 



