S80 Baron Cuvier o?i Caverns containing Banes. 



drew plans and outlines of them, and published upon the 

 subject a work full of interest, which he has called Reliquiw 

 Diluviance. 



It is to this profound geologist we are indebted for the dis- 

 covery of the bones in the cavern of Oiselles, It was indeed 

 natural to suppose that the Jura would contain the remains of 

 these animals, as it is a continuation of the Alps of Suabia, 

 and the cavernous mountains of Franconia, and contains itself 

 many of these excavations, and is also as celebrated for its 

 stalactites as any of the mountains of Germany. They had 

 already collected in a cleft of a rock at Fouvent, in the de- 

 partment of the upper Saone, the bones of several of the ani- 

 mals found in the English caverns ; but nobody having con- 

 tinued to follow up this discovery, all this was a matter of con- 

 jecture. 



Mr Buckland, while visiting the cavern of Oiselles, which had 

 long been an object of curiosity, both on account of its mag- 

 nitude, and of the brilliant stalactites with which it is adorned, 

 observed that it had all the appearances of the caverns of 

 bones in Franconia. He even thought he observed a part 

 where the bones were very near the surface, and, upon trying 

 it with the hammer, he had the pleasure to find his conjecture 

 verified. 



The prefect of Doubs took all the interest in this natural 

 curiosity which it justly deserved, and the examination which 

 he ordered, and which was conducted with the greatest zeal 

 by Mr Gevril, keeper of the cabinet of Besan^on, has proved 

 that this cavern contains a quantity of bones as surprising as 

 any of those of Franconia. 



'-'A certain quantity of these fossils was sent to the Museum 

 at Paris, and it was easy to determine to what species they be- 

 longed. " That which has surprised us,'"* says M. Cuvier, " is 

 not that fhey belong to the great bear with the protuberant 

 forehead (front hombe) which naturalists particularly call the 

 bear of the cave (JJrsus spelcBus) because they have never 

 found their remains anywhere but in similar grottos to that 

 of Oiselles, but that they should all belong to that species." 



M. Cuvier presented some of the specimens to the academy. 

 They consisted of two heads quite entire, one humerus, a 

 part of the scapula, a cubitus, a radius, a pelvis nearly en- 



