

THE HUMAN SPECIES. 99 



tained, whether the explanations that have been offered, 

 with a view of proving that they are of a more recent 

 date, can be substantiated. Those found in the clefts 

 of lime rock in England (1787), were reburied or 

 thrown on the public road, without further notice. 

 The late Rev. Mr. M'Enery disposed of those he 

 found without examination ; and, as it appears to us, 

 his replies to our interrogations, and his letter, after- 

 wards published, did not exactly coincide, since there 

 was some disparity in the bones not being all found 

 above the stalagmite, but partly below. The criterion 

 for pronouncing on the age of vertebrata remains, we 

 believe, rests solely, beside the circumstances of loca- 

 tion, upon the absence or presence of animal matter in 

 them ; in the first case, a bone sticks to the tongue, 

 in the second, it is not adhesive. No series of experi- 

 ments elaborately made, so far as we know, has yet 

 determined to what extent the criterion can be trusted. 

 Mr. Franklin Bellamy, with his usual patient caution, 

 submitted a portion of bone from the Yealm Bridge 

 Cave, weighing one drachm ; and also a piece of bone, 

 of the same weight, taken from one by the road side, 

 that might have been exposed for many months ; each 

 was placed in a separate glass vessel, containing diluted 

 muriatic acid. As soon as the fossil bone was im- 

 mersed, a violent action commenced to disengage car- 

 bonic acid; gradual corrosion, or removal of earthy 

 matter succeeded, and, in the space of seven hours, 

 the bone was reduced to a spongy flocculent mass, 

 which having become lighter than the fluid, rose to the 



