HARDWICKE'S SCIENCE-GOSSIP. 



6 9 



Primroses and Cattle. — While turning over 

 the pages of Withering's "British Plants," London, 

 1S01, since I wrote my query at p. 20 of Science- 

 Gossip, I found at p. 229 of vol. ii. the following 

 corroboration of my experience as to sheep and goats 

 eating primroses : " Sheep and goats eat it, cows 

 are not fond of it, horses and swine refuse it. — Linn." 

 Here we have the great Linnaeus saying the very 

 opposite to Dr. Spencer Thompson. Some of your 

 readers might give the ipsissima verba of the Swede. 

 H. IV. Lett, M.A. 



Localities for Dianthus armeria. — Twelve 

 years ago I knew two localities for D. armeria near 

 Castletown, in the Isle of Man. One of them was 

 in a field adjoining the grounds of King William's 

 College, the other near Ballasalla. The former spot, 

 however, when I revisited it in 18S0, had been 

 converted into the site of a new chapel for King 

 William's, and I fear all traces of the plant there 

 perished. I hope that it may survive in the second 

 locality, but the island is so ransacked by tourists in 

 summer that the existence of any botanical curiosity 

 is mournfully precarious. — C. B. Moffat. 



Plants from the Isle of Wight.— Of the plants 

 mentioned by Mr. Parkinson (p. 45), Ornithogahtm 

 2imbellatum and Polemonium caruleum have been 

 recorded before, and are both probably, the latter 

 certainly, the remains or escapes of cultivation. 

 Epipactls, or,'as it is now usually named, Cephalanthera 

 ensifolia, has never been authentically recorded as 

 found in the Island, and the locality, " woods of the 

 Undercliff," does not strike one as being at all a likely 

 one. This species, unlike C. grandiflora, is decidedly 

 rare on the mainland of Hants, and I have never 

 seen it or heard of it, except in beech woods on the 

 chalk. I cannot help suspecting that some other 

 plant has been mistaken for it, perhaps E. palnstris. 

 —F. I. Warner, F.L.S. 



GEOLOGY, &c. 



Bone Caves in North Wales. — Dr. Hicks and 

 Mr. W. Davies have just given the results of re- 

 searches carried on in these caverns in the summers 

 of 1883, 1884, and 1885 by Mr. E. Bouverie Lux- 

 moore, of St. Asaph, to the Geological Society. The 

 enormous collection of bones belonging to the now 

 extinct animals of Pleistocene age obtained had been 

 submitted for examination to Mr. W. Davies, and 

 afterwards distributed to various museum-. Several 

 wall-worked flint implements were also discovered in 

 association with the bones. The following are the 

 conclusions arrived at from the facts obtained 

 during the explorations : — That abundant evidence 

 has been furnished to show that the caverns had 

 been occupied by hyaenas, and possibly by other 

 beasts of prey, as dens, into which portions of 

 carcasses of various animals had been conveyed in 

 Pleistocene times. The very great abundance of 



some animals, such as the rhinoceros, horse, and 

 reindeer, and the frequent presence of bones belong- 

 ing to young animals, proved that the plain of the 

 Vale of Clwyd, with that extending northward 

 under the Irish Sea, must have formed a 

 favourite feeding-ground even at that time. The 

 flint implements and worked bones showed also that 

 man was contemporary with these animals. The 

 ravine in which the caverns occur must have been 

 scooped previous to the deposition in it of the glacial 

 sands and Boulder-clays. This sand and clay, there 

 seems good evidence to show, must have filled up 

 the ravine to a height above the entrances to the 

 caverns, and such sands and clays are now found at 

 some points to completely fill up the caverns. The 

 following seem to Dr. Hicks to be the changes 

 indicated by the deposits. The lowest in the caverns, 

 consisting almost entirely of local materials, must 

 have been introduced by a river which flowed in the 

 valley at a very much higher level than does the little 

 stream at present. Gradually, as the valley was 

 being excavated, and the caverns were above the 

 reach of floods, hyaenas and other beasts of prey 

 occupied them, and conveyed the remains of other 

 animals into them. Man also must have been present 

 at some part of this period. Gradually the land 

 became depressed, the animals disappeared, stalag- 

 mite was formed, and the sea at last entered the 

 caverns, filling them up with sands and pebbles, and 

 burying also the remains not washed out. Floating 

 ice deposited in this sea the fragments of rocks 

 derived from northern sources, and these became 

 mixed with local rocks and clays brought down from 

 surrounding areas. The greater part of the Boulder- 

 clay in the Vale of Clwyd was probably deposited as 

 the land was being raised out of this mid-glacial 

 sea. During the process of elevation the caverns 

 became again disturbed by marine action and the 

 upper fine reddish loam and the laminated clays 

 were deposited. It seemed impossible to avoid the 

 conclusion, that these caverns must have been sub« 

 merged, and afterwards elevated to their present 

 height of about 400 feet above the level of the sea, 

 since they were occupied by Palaeolithic man and the 

 Pleistocene animals. 



British Petrography. — We are pleased to 

 notice the appearance of the first part (price 3-r.) of a 

 work which has long been required, and which every 

 month it becomes more imperative to supply — Mr. 

 J. J. Harris Teall's Monograph on the ordinary rocks 

 of the British Islands. Every one interested in the 

 study of rocks will be glad to subscribe to this in- 

 valuable work, particularly as nobody is better 

 capable of bringing it out than Mr. Teall. The first 

 part contains two exquisitely got-up coloured plates, 

 with key-plates (by Messrs. Watson, of Birmingham), 

 and they and the text deal with Lherzolite, Serpen- 

 tine, Picrite, etc. 



