160 HUMAN FOSSILS m 



valuable work, " Becherches sur les Ossemens 

 fossiles decouverts dans les Cavernes de la Province 

 de Liege," published in 1833 (p. 59, et seq.), from 

 which the following paragraphs are extracted, the 

 precise expressions of the author being, as far as 

 possible, preserved. 



"In the first place, I must remark that these human remains, 

 which are in my possession, are characterised, like the thousands 

 of bones which I have lately been disinterring, by the extent 

 of the decomposition which they have undergone, which is 

 precisely the same as that of the extinct species : all, with a 

 few exceptions, are broken ; some few are rounded, as is fre- 

 quently found to be the case in fossil remains of other species. 

 The fractures are vertical or oblique ; none of them are eroded ; 

 their colour does not differ from that of other fossil bones, and 

 varies from whitish yellow to blackish. All are lighter than 

 recent bones, with the exception of those which have a calcareous 

 incrustation, and the cavities of which are filled with such 

 matter. 



" The cranium which I have caused to be figured, Plate I, 

 figs. 1, 2, is that of an old person. The sutures are beginning 

 to lie effaced : all the facial bones are wanting, and of the 

 temporal bones only a fragment of that of the right side is 

 preserved. 



"The face and the base of the cranium had been detached 

 before the skull was deposited in the cave, for we were unable 

 to find those parts, though the whole cavern was regularly 

 searched. The cranium was met with at a depth of a metre and 

 a half [five feet nearly] hidden under an osseous breccia, com- 

 posed of the remains of small animals, and containing one 

 rhinoceros' tusk, with several teeth of horses and of ruminants. 

 This breccia, which has been spoken of above (p. 31), was a 

 metre [3- feet about] wide, and rose to the height of a metre 

 and a half above the floor of the cavern, to the walls of which 

 it adhered strongly. 



