82 Proceedings of the Royal Physical Society. 



to me to have an important bearing, not only on the question 

 of the different kinds of horses, but also on that of their 

 domestication, I shall examine the evidence with some care. 

 The cave of Combarelles, supposed to be the dried bed 

 of a former subterranean stream, extends, in the form of a 

 serpentine tunnel, to 234 m. in length, with an average 

 breadth of 1 to 2 m. and a height of 1-60 to 1-75 m. Only 

 exceptionally does the height reach, or go beyond, 2 m., but 

 sometimes it sinks so low that one has to creep to get along. 

 The floor and roof, are occasionally so much encrusted with 

 stalagmitic deposits as to modify the original height con- 

 siderably, but the walls are rarely covered with more than a 

 film, which, in some parts, is absent altogether. The en- 

 gravings begin at a distance of 118 m. from the entrance, 

 and are continued, on both sides, with only slight intervals, 

 for 100 m. to within a few yards of the terminal end of the 

 cavern. The average breadth of these tableaux is 1'50 m. 

 When the reduced drawings were completed and extended 

 on paper they formed a band 12 m. in length and 10 to 12 

 cm. in breadth. The lines delineating some of the figures 

 are incised up to a maximum depth of 5 to 6 mm., and over 

 them the stalagmitic film sometimes attains such a thickness 

 as to completely mask the design. On the other hand, the 

 incised lines are occasionally made more conspicuous by the 

 addition of a thin band of black paint, as seen in Fig. 3. 

 The figures represent animals in various attitudes, and the 

 style, as well as the manner of execution of the designs, 

 strongly reminds one of the reindeer hunters of La Madelaine 

 and other stations of the later Palaeolithic period. 



The total number of animals outlined, so far as they could 

 be distinctly made out, is 109 : animals entire but not 

 identified, 19 ; Equidse, 23 ; Bovidse, 3 ; bison, 2 ; reindeer, 3 ; 

 mammoth, 14 ; heads of goats, 3 ; heads of antelopes, 4 ; 

 heads of various animals, chiefly horses, 36 ; human face, 

 1 (•) ; cup mark, 1. These engravings betray so much artistic 

 skill, precision of details, and knowledge of animal life, that 

 MM. Capitan and Breuil regard them as precise documents 

 in Palaeontology. Equidse being the most frequent of all 

 animals figured in this cave, no less than 40 illustrations, 



