APPENDIX A 329 



Although Dr. Ilauthal's explorations were rather hurried and Dr. 

 NordenskjOld's results have only been published hitherto in abstract,* 

 their account of the deposits on the floor of the cavern seem to confirm 

 the suspicion that the remains of these two faunas were introduced at two 

 successive periods. According to liauthal, the remains of the Guanaco 

 were found along with fragmentary bones of Deer, shells oi JMyti/us choruSy 

 branches of trees, and dried leaves, in the superficial dust of the cavern 

 near the outer wall. The skin of GrypotJicriiuii and all the other remains 

 of this and the associated Pampean genera were discovered in the deeper 

 layer of excrement and cut hay between the mound and the inner wall of 

 the cavern. According to Nordenskjold, three distinct strata can be 

 recojinised on the floor of the cavern as follows : 



'to' 



A. A thin surface layer, containing ashes, shells, and bones of recent animals 



broken by man. 



B. A middle layer, containing numerous branches of trees and dried leaves, with 



remains oi Lama and the extinct horse, Onohippidium. Said to be probably 

 the stratum in which the original piece of skin was found. 



C. A bottom layer, usually about a metre in thickness, without any traces of 



branches or leaves, but only dried herbs. Remains of Grypvthcrium 

 numerous and confined to this stratum, associated with its excrement and 

 hair, also with remains of a large variety of Fdis onca, MacraucJuitia, and 

 Onohippiiliuiii. 



It is unfortunate that the question of the contemporaneity of the 

 various bones cannot be tested by the ingenious method of chemical 

 analysis which has been applied with success to similar problems by 

 M. Adolphe Carnot in France. The French chemist has shown that when 

 bones are buried in ordinary sediments they undergo changes which 

 gradually cause the percentage of contained fluorine to increase. Accord- 

 ing to him, the longer a bone has been buried, the greater is the percentage 

 of fluorine found in it on analysis. In one case f he examined the scapula of 

 a deer and a human tibia, discovered together in fluviatile sand near Billan- 

 court (Seine) ; he found that the former had seven or eight times its usual 

 percentage of fluorine, while the human bone did not differ in any respect 

 from the normal in this constituent. He therefore concluded that the 

 latter bone was not of the same age as the former, but had been intro- 

 duced comparatively recently by burial. In this and the other recorded 

 cases, however, it is to be observed that the sediment was of a uniform 

 character and admitted of free percolation of water. In the Patagonian 

 cavern, on the contrary, the bones occur partly in dust, partly in dried 



■■■- E. Nordenskjold, " LaGrotte du GlossotheriHm{N corny lodott) en Patagonie," Compte* 

 Rendus, vol. c.x.xix. (iSyg), pp. 121(1. 121 7. 



t A. Carnot, " Sur une .Application de IWnalyse chimiciuc pour fixer l'.\gr d'Ossc- 

 ments humains prehistoriques," Coinptes Rendus, vol. cxv, (1892), pp. 337-339- 



