Marsh. 191 



mains are found in them. How have these remains been 

 preserved through such vast ages ? When rain-water soaks 

 through chalk or limestone it dissolves, by virtue of the car- 

 bonic acid gas which it contains, a quantity of the mineral 

 matter ; but when the water evaporates, the solid matter is 

 left behind. The bones of animals which have used these 

 caves for lairs, and the bones of the victims on whom they 

 have preyed have, whilst lying on the floors of the caverns, 

 been soaked in the water which has found its way through 

 the rock above into the cave, and the water evaporating, the 

 solid limestone matter which was dissolved in the water 

 has been left behind. The bones have then become hard- 

 ened, and the ordinary organic parts decaying, their place 

 has been taken by the deposited limestone, until the whole 

 has become calcified. In the course of ages the floor of the 

 cave itself is raised by these limestone deposits, the bones 

 are buried, and their relative position in the ever-thickening 

 floor thus formed, gives us a clue to their relative age. 

 Preserved in this way we find the remains of man which, 

 by their position, must have existed before the mammoth 

 was extinct, and at a time when the reindeer was an inhabit- 

 ant of Central Europe. 



By the actual remains of man, then, and by his works, we 

 read his history in the past, not clearly nor distinctly, but 

 brokenly and dimly, yet, in spite of the piecemeal character 

 of the evidence, with a large amount of certainty withal. 

 This history has to be sought out and inquired into by those 

 who would pierce Nature's deepest recesses and inquire 

 into her greatest secrets, by those votaries who find their 

 greatest enjoyment in the interpretation of what appears to 

 more superficial observers to be hidden, and in unfolding 



