77 
ORDINARY MEETING, Fesrvary 21, 1887. 
H. CapmMan Jones, Hsq., IN THE CHAIR. 
The Minutes of the last Meeting were read and confirmed, and the 
following Elections were announced :— 
Member :—Rev. B. R. Wilson, M.A., Queensland. 
AssocraTE :—C. M. Davis, Esq., A.M., United States. 
Hon. CorrEsponDENt :—Rey. A. B. Hutchinson, A.M., Japan. 
The following Paper was then read by the Author :— 
ON OAVES. By T. McKanyy Huauss, M.A., F.S.A., 
F.G.S., Woodwardian Professor of Geology, Cambridge. 
OW and then it falls to our lot to find an old MS. which 
throws a flood of light upon some obscure part of 
history. It had been put aside, buried under a heap of 
documents of more immediate importance, forgotten till some 
accident exposed it, some more careful eye caught sight of 
it, some more experienced judgment recognised its interest. 
Such to the geologist is a cave. 
He runs his eye over the contents; they may be of little 
value, or may settle what has long been a matter of speculation 
or of controversy. They may be a record of the household 
consumption of some wild beast in his castle; they may tell of 
the ancient conflict of forces of nature now at rest; or they 
may derive their chief interest from the character of the 
material on which the record is preserved. 
But the MS. might be passed over, or not read aright, 
if the discoverer be no paleeographer. 
So the observer may arrive at very wrong conclusions as to 
the age and history of a cave, unless he be familiar with the 
operations of nature which form and fill such caves. ‘This, 
then, is the point on which I invite discussion this evening : 
The formation of caves and cave-deposits, with references to 
some of the more interesting of those which have been 
explored. 
‘To arrange our subject, I would first notice that there 
are artificial as well as natural caves, and many natural caves 
