THE OSSIFEROUS CAVERNS OF DEVONSHIRE. 363 
(see Phil. Trans. 1817, pp.176—182). This request was cheerfully 
complied with, and Mr. Whidbey had the pleasure of discovering 
bone-caves in November, 1816, November, 1820, August and 
November, 1822, and of sending the remains found in them to the 
Royal Society. It is, perhaps, worthy of remark that, though 
cavern-researches received a great impulse from the discoveries in 
Kirkdale, Yorkshire, and especially from Dr. Buckland’s well-known 
and graphic description of them, such researches had originated 
many years before. The request by Sir Joseph Banks was made 
at least as early as 1812 (see Trans. Devon. Assoc. v. pp. 252, 253), 
and a paper on the Oreston discoveries was read to the Royal Society 
in February, 1817, whereas the Kirkdale Cavern was not discovered 
until 1821. British cave-hunting appears to have been a science 
of Devonshire birth. The Oreston Caverns soon attracted a con- 
siderable number of able observers; they were visited in 1822 by 
Dr. Buckland and Mr. Warburton; and in a comparatively short 
time became the theme of a somewhat voluminous literature. 
Nothing of, importance, however, seems to have been met with 
from 1822 until 1858, when another cavern, containing a large 
number of bones, was broken into. Unfortunately there was no 
one at hand to superintend the exhumation of the specimens; the 
work was left entirely to the common workmen, and was badly 
done; many of the remains were dispersed beyond recovery; the 
matrix in which they were buried was never adequately examined; 
and we are utterly ignorant, and must for ever remain so, as to 
whether they did or did not contain indications of human existence. 
I visited the spot from time to time, and bought up everything to 
be met with; but other scientific work in another part of the county 
occupied me too closely to allow more than an occasional visit. 
The greater part of the specimens I secured were lodged in the 
British Museum, where they seem to have been forgotten, whilst a 
few remain in my private collection. Some difference of opinion 
has existed respecting the character of the successive caverns, 
and much mystery has been imported into the question of the 
introduction of their contents. Mr. Whidbey, it is said, “saw 
no possibility of the cavern of 1816 having had any external 
communication through the rock in which it was enclosed” (Phil. 
Trans. 1817, pp. 176—182); but Dr. Buckland was of opinion that 
they were all at first fissures open at the top, and “that the openings 
had been long filled up with rubbish, mud, stalactite, or fragments 
