252 



PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY. 





Kirkdale Cave. 



to which they belonged were the hyasna, bear, tiger, and lion, elephant, rhinoceros, 

 hippopotamus, horse, ox, deer of three species, water-rat, and mouse, belonging wholly to 

 extinct species, and the 

 same with those with 

 which we are acquainted 

 in the steppes of Asia. 

 The most plentiful of 

 all were the remains of 

 the hyaena, and from the 

 amount which he saw, 

 Buckland estimated the 

 number of the individ- 

 uals interred here to be 

 between two and three 

 hundred. The animal 

 must have been one half 

 larger than the living 

 species, in its structure 

 resembling the hyaena of 

 the Cape. The bears, 

 which were less abun- 

 dant, belonged to the 

 large cavern species, which, according to Cuvier, was of the size of a large white horse 

 and about eighteen feet in length. The elephants were the Siberian mammoth. Of 

 the stags the largest was of the size of the moose deer. Of the ox two species were 

 distinguished, and its bones were most frequent next to those of the hyaena. All these 

 bones lay irregularly strewed one with another, but those of the largest animals were 

 in the most remote and narrowest corners, into which they never could have pene- 

 trated while living. The teeth, and the hard marrowless bones of the extremities, as 

 well as those of the fore and hind feet, were*- uninjured : these were so numerous 

 that they must have belonged to a much greater number of individuals than could be 

 estimated as belonging to the other bones. Many of the bones bore marks which 

 exactly corresponded with the form of the incisor teeth of the hyaena, and the broken 

 horns of the stag were evidently marked by gnawing. These facts warranted the con- 

 clusion, that the hyaenas must have lived for a long time in this cave, and have dragged 

 the bones of the larger animals, particularly the oxen, into this den, as their prey. The 

 supposition was confirmed in the most striking manner by a variety of other facts. 

 Dr. Buckland found that bones which he caused to be gnawed by living hyaenas had 

 exactly the same appearance as those found in the cavern, and the teeth and harder bones 

 were thrown aside by them. He even found in great abundance excrements of the 

 hyaena, which offered the closest resemblance to those of the living animal. From 

 the facts described, it appears that the Kirkdale cave was for a long series of years a den 

 inhabited by hyaenas, who dragged into its recesses the other animal bodies whose remains 

 are there commingled with their own, some great catastrophe causing an inundation in 

 this region which destroyed the whole race. 



Similar zoolithic caverns occur in the following places in our own country : 1. Kent's 

 Cavern, in the limestone of North Devon, about a mile from Torquay. It is said to be 

 nearly six hundred feet long, varying in width from two to seventy feet, and in height 

 from one to six yards. The bones of extinct species of animals are found buried in a 

 mass of mud, covered over with a crust of stalagmitic formation. From certain appear- 



