of Fossil Bones at North Cliff, Yorkshire. 5 



the characters of" a tranquil sediment ; scarcely a stone was 

 found in it which might not have been carried by the gentlest 

 current; the whole mass was impregnated with minutely divided 

 animal and vegetable matter, and gave out a fetid odour ; so 

 loose was its texture, though it might be pressed into a clay 

 tenacious enough for brick-making, that it worked very lightly, 

 and crumbled, as it was thrown out, into mould : the ten- 

 derest shells were perfectly preserved ; the bones showed no 

 signs of having been rolled ; their edges had lost none of their 

 sharpness ; their angles were in no degree smoothened. Out of 

 a hundred bones, and fragments of bones, I could find but two 

 which were rubbed, and these were worn and polished at the 

 points of the extremities alone. 



The fragments had been brought into the state in which 

 they were found by various causes ; some had been apparently 

 fractured before they were floated in, others had been broken 

 in their place by unequal pressure ; some had split asunder by 

 a longitudinal cleavage, others had fallen to pieces by chemi- 

 cal decomposition : the latter ^'ect had taken place chiefly in 

 the upper and wetter marl. 



Nothing like an entire skeleton was found ; but in some in- 

 stances bones lay together which articulated with one another : 

 thus the humeius, radius and ulna of the wolf were not far 

 separated ; and the coronary phalangial bones of the horse were 

 found in regular order: the second a little below the first, and 

 the third a little below the second. The magnitude* of these 

 phalangial bones is remarkable when compai'ed with those of 

 the ancient British horse; I have seen some which were taken 

 out of a barrow in the East Riding of Yorkshire, by the llev. 

 Mr. Stillingfleet, and I think they are not more than half the 

 size. 



Upon the whole, all the appearances hitherto described may 

 be very well accounted for by the common operation of a river 

 like the Humber, in forming alluvial tracts. We may con- 

 ceive the lowest alternations of the marl to have been deposited 

 by successive tides ; we may conceive a 7nc7-e to have been by 

 degrees banked up, in which some molluscous kinds lived, and 

 into which others were washed from the surrounding marshes, 

 together with the remains of the animals which frequented 

 them, some of which may have perished by violence and some 

 by natural decay; and lastly, we may conceive the same ground, 

 by some demolition of its embankments, to have been after- 



* Lcngtii of 1st coronary 3n; Length of 2nd coronary 2'25 ; 

 Greatest brcailih oflicacl 2-7-"> ; Greatest brcadtli of head 2-CO; 



Brcadlli across the ends of the hist bone y-40; 



Versed sine of ditto 2-7 i>. 



Avards 



