40 PAPEE8, ETC. 



elcphant, in our collection. Tlie largest clephant known 

 would be small and puny by the side of tbe individual 

 to whom this bone belonged. This bone is 22 inches in 

 girth. The tush of the samc animal (possibly), or one like 

 bim, in Mr. Beard's collection is six feet long, and two feet 

 in cirenmference ! and it is eupposed that it must bave 

 been füll 16 feet long when tlie animal was living. The 

 size of the beasts of prey in those days was on the same 

 scale. The fangs of the tiger and the bear in our Museum 

 prove that ; but the skulls in Mr. Beard's collection estab- 

 lish it beyond a doubt. There I saw the thigh-bone of a 

 bear 21^ inches long! I placed by its side the corres- 

 ponding bone of a full-grown bear killed at Bristol. The 

 bear of the Mendip Hills must have been three or four 

 times as large ! The skull of a bear in bis collection is 

 nearly two feet long. The same applies to the remains of 

 the tiger. The bones of the head found in these caverns 

 clearly prove the species to have been of a considerably 

 larger size than any known species in the present day. 

 The hysenas of that period, in like manner, were of gigan- 

 tic dimensions, as the size of tbeir heads and jaws testify. 

 I need not cnlarge upon the remains of the deer tribe with 

 branching antlers, nor upon those of the boar, the liorse, 

 the ox, and the sheep, which are found in great abundance 

 in the caverns. The bones of these animals oeeur in such 

 numbers as clearly to shew that they were the food of the 

 carnivorous beasts of prey, whose haunts were in these 

 caves. I do not attach much importance to the remains of 

 hares, mice, rats, and bats, which are deposited in our 

 Museum, as having been found in the Mendip caverns. 

 That animals of these species existed cotemporaneously 

 with the tiger and the elephant is not improbable, but the 

 bones wc bave appear as if they belonged to a much more 



