NATURAL HISTORY OF CREATION. 109 



weazel, fox, wolf, bear, tiger, hyena. From many of 

 the bones of the gentler of these animals being found in 

 a broken state, it is supposed that the cave was a haunt 

 of hyenas and other predaceous animals, by which the 

 smaller ones were here consumed. This must have been 

 at a time antecedent to the submersion which produced 

 the diluvium, since the bones are covered by a bed of 

 that formation. It is impossible not to see here a very 

 natural series of incidents. First, the cave is frequented 

 by wild beasts, who make it a kind of charnel-house. 

 Then, submerged in the current which has been spoken 

 of, it receives a clay flooring from the waters containing 

 that matter in suspension. Finally, raised from the 

 water, but with no mouth to the open air, it remains 

 unintruded on for a long series of ages, during which 

 the clay flooring receives a new calcareous covering from 

 the droppings of the roof. Dr. Buckland, who examined 

 and described the Kirkdale cave, was at first of opinion 

 that it presented a physical evidence of the Noachian 

 deluge; but he afterwards saw reason to consider its 

 phenomena as of a time far apart from that event, which 

 rests on evidence of an entirely different kind. 



Our attention is next drawn to the erratic blocks or 

 boulders, which in many parts of the earth are thickly 

 strewn over the surface, particularly in the north of 

 Europe. Some of these blocks are many tons in weight, 

 yet are clearly ascertained to have belonged originally to 

 situations at a great distance. Fragments, for example, 

 of the granite of 8hap Fell are found in every direction 

 around to the distance of fifty miles, one piece being 

 placed high upon Criffel Mountain, on the opposite side 

 of the Sol way estuary ; so also are fragments of the Alps 

 found far u[) tlie slopes of the Jura. There are even 

 blocks on the east coast of England, supposed to have 



