40 Tlic Irish Naiuralisi. March, 



the ends of the marrow-bones broken off, as used to be done 

 by all ancient peoples to the bones of Ox and other large 

 animals. In the same stratum was much burned wood, the 

 charcoal forming a layer in one place, also sea shells and 

 hammer-stones chipped by repeated blows. These facts all 

 point to the cave having been the retreat of the men who 

 hunted and ate the Irish Elk. Under the grey earth was a 

 floor of cr_vstalline stalagmite, which in one place was 3 ft. 

 6 in. thick ; and under this again, reposing on a floor of gravel 

 or embedded in the stalagmite, were the jaws, teeth and bones 

 of a huge species of Bear, and some bones of Reindeer. 



The Ballynamintra Cave, therefore, though a small one, 

 gives testimony to three ages ; the Neolithic men left relics in 

 the brow^n earth on top, the elk hunters in the grej- earth, and 

 before the crystalline stalagmite was deposited the Grisly 

 Bear lived on the gravel floor left by a subterranean river. 

 The collections of objects found occupy a separate case in our 

 Museum of Natural History. "• In 1S98 Mr. Plunkett of Ennis- 

 killen described to the British Association the finding in a 

 Co. Fermanagh cave of a Bear's skull, which is also in the 

 Museum.-^ 



In 1 90 1, accompanied by Dr. Scharff and Mr. Cofiey, I 

 worked a cave in Keshcorran Mountain, Co. vSligo, one of 

 thirteen \vhicli penetrate a range of cliffs about 300 feet above 

 the mountain's base. There were two distinct strata ; the up- 

 permost, like that at Ballynamintra, contained bones of 

 domestic animals and man, a polished stone celt, a bronze- 

 ringed pin, part of a little iron saw, and a large boue needle 

 and comb. But it also contained a metatarsus of Reindeer, 

 beneath which charcoal was found, and this seems fair proof 

 that the Reindeer had been brought in for food by man. The 

 second stratum yielded many bones of Brow^i Bear and of the 

 Arctic Lemming, an animal first found in Ireland by Dr. 

 Scharff, who, while we were digging at the mouth of one of 

 the caves, stooped down and exclaimed : " This place is a mass 

 of little bones.'' This species of Eemming is not now found 

 nearer than Greenland. Some remains of Wolf were found in 

 both strata, as well as those of Red Dter. ' 



V^;w. R. I. Acad. (2), vol. ii., 1881 (abstract). Sd. Trans-. R, Ditbl. Soc, 

 vol. i., 1881 (full Report). 



* Brit, Assocn. Report, 1 898, p. 885. 



3 Trans. R. /. Acad., vol. xxxii., B, pt. iv.. 1903. 



