﻿NO. I 



SMITHSONIAN EXPLORATIONS, I925 



17 



necessity of a prompt following up by scientific men of each such 

 accidental discovery. The impracticability of such a following up 

 in this case has resulted in a number of errors and uncertainties on 

 important aspects of the case, some of which have already misled 

 students of the find. It was possible to clear up some of the mooted 

 points, but others remain obscure and can be definitely decided only 

 by further discoveries. 



As one of the results of the present visit, it was possible to save 

 and bring for study a collection of bones of animals from the cave. 



Fig. 78. — Animal and human bones secured by Dr. Hrdlicka at the Broken 

 Hill Mine; all from the Bone Cave. (Photograph by Dr. Hrdlicka.) 



the lower recesses of which gave the Rhodesian skull, and also two 

 additional mineralized human bones belonging to two individuals ; 

 all of which, to facilitate the study of the whole subject, were de- 

 posited with the earlier relics in the British Museum. The mine is 

 by no means exhausted, and since the interest of everybody on the 

 spot is now fully aroused to these matters, there is hope that more 

 of value may yet be given to science from this locality. 



A visit to the Taungs or rather Buxton quarry which yielded, 

 late in 1924, the high-class anthropoid ape announced in February of 

 this year by Professor Dart {Nature, Feb. 7), revealed also most 

 interesting conditions from the standpoint of geology, paleontology, 

 and anthropology. Here are remnants of a vast plateau, eroded in 

 the middle by a river to a shallow valley with an escarpment of long 

 cliffs on each side. In the western escarpment, in ferruginous shales. 



