160 REPOKT 1871. 



not sufficieutly prominent, art was had recourse to, as in tlie Castle Hill at Cam- 

 bridge, Silbury Hill, &c. He considered these, evidences of the custom of worship 

 on the tops of such mountains, from their orientation, and recalled the fact of many 

 mountains still bearing names indicative of Baal- or Sun-worship ; that the flowing 

 stream formed a division of sanctification or purity ; that each settlement had its 

 hiU of worship, and that the modern church-spires of the plains had replaced the 

 aspirino- flame which once ascended from the several tribal districts or divisions 

 of our land ; and that on or near these places of previous occupancy were founded 

 our oldest cities. 



From the juxtaposition of ancient British pottery, where large and small urns 

 were found together, from the lateral perforations of both, distinct from perfora- 

 tions for suspension (an example of which in the possession of Professor Rolleston 

 at Oxford has these perforations less than two inches from the bottom of an urn pf 

 the larger kind), from the material found in the small urns differing from that in 

 the large, and in one case being a mummified heart-shaped body, he concluded 

 that thi; preservation of the heart in the small urn was also a custom with these 

 ancient people. 



Discovery of Flint Implements in Egypt, at Mount Sinai, at Oalyala, and in 

 JosJiua's Tomb. By the AsBi Eichard. 



On Bl-iills presentiny Sagittal Synostosis. By Professor Stkuthers. 



On Lnplements found in King Arthur's Cave, near Whitchurch. 

 By the Eev. W. S. Symonds, M.A., F.G.S. 



On IIum.an and Animal Bones and Flints from a Cave at Ohan, Argyleshire. 



By Professor Turner. 



All who are acquainted with the topography of Oban, Argyleshire, will re- 

 member that immediately behind the houses, which extend in a long row parallel 

 to the sea-beach, an almost perpendicidar wall of rock rises to a considerable height. 



At the north end of the bay, near Burn Bank House, the rock rises abruptly 

 from the road to the height of a little more than 40 feet. Ivy, mountain-ash, and 

 black-thorn grew out of the chinks in the upper part of the face of the precipice. 

 A bank of earth sloped from the road, at an angle of about 45°, halfway up the 

 face of the rock. Growing out of this bank were several beach trees, none of which 

 had attained any great size ; the diameter of the root of the largest was not more 

 than 18 inches. 



In the summer of 1869, workmen in the employ of Mr. John Mackay, of Oban, 

 were engaged in quarrying the north-west face of the rock for building pm-poses, 

 and after penetrating about 15 feet into the substance of the rock, they opened 

 into the deeper end of a cave filled with earth in which a number of bones were 

 found. On the removal of more of the rock and of the bank of earth from its 

 south-eastern aspect, the cave was more fully exposed, and the position and di- 

 rection of its original entrance were ascertained. 



The rock was a dull purple micaceous sandstone, through which ran thin part- 

 ings of green sandy shale, and belongs, as my colleague Professor Geikie tells me, 

 to an outlying area of the Old Red Sandstone. 



The cave consisted of a chamber and an entrance-passage. The chamber was 11 

 feet high and the same in depth. The entrance-passage was 4 feet high and 9 feet 

 long, and sloped from the entrance dovra to the floor of the chamber, which it 

 joined at a decided angle. The mouth of the cave was thus higher than the floor 

 of the chamber. It faced to the south, and about 20 feet in thickness of an em- 

 bankment of earth had to be removed before the entrance was exposed. The cave 

 was almost filled up with earth, in which were foimd numerous bones and flints. 



