ON Kent's cavern^ Devonshire. 41 



to whom Mr. Rodway says the teeth belonged, all the remains are portions 

 of the same skeleton, and that they had been preserved in a cinerary urn of 

 which the potsherds found with them were fragments. 



There was a continuous Stalagmitic Floor from the entrance of the Char- 

 coal Cave to 19 feet mthin it, except at one place, where it did not quite ex- 

 tend from wall to wall. In the next 5 feet the Cave-earth was without any 

 covering, but at 25 feet from the entrance a floor again presented itself. It 

 was of the usual character, varied from 2 to 12 inches thick, and near the 

 entrance there was in it, about 2 inches below the surface, a thin layer of 

 carbonaceous matter. 



In the northern branch the floor was everywhere continuous, and varied 

 from 18 inches thick at the entrance to 1 inch at the inner end. In the 

 central branch the floor was but partial, never exceeded 9 inches thick, and 

 was occasionally no more than a mere film. In one or two instances pieces 

 of Old Crystalline Floor were incorporated in it. There was very little floor 

 in the southern branch. 



Remnants of an old floor hi situ, extending from waU to wall, presented 

 themselves in each of the branches, always at some height above the Cave- 

 earth. They were indications, of course, of the former existence, and at 

 least partial dislodgement, of a deposit older than the Cave-earth, and which 

 there attained a higher level. The most considerable of them was in the 

 central branch : it was from 9 to 10 feet long, 3 inches thick ; its upper 

 surface was 1-5 foot below the limestone roof, and its lower surface 4 feet 

 above the granular Stalagmitic Floor, the spaces between it and the ruof 

 above, and the ordinary floor below, being quite unoccupied. The remnants 

 in the other branches differ from this in their measurements only. 



With exceptions in portions of the central and southern branches, to be 

 noticed immediately, the mechanical deposit in the Charcoal Cave was true 

 Cave-earth. At the entrance, and for about 11 feet within, it contained an 

 unusually great number of fragments of limestone from top to bottom of the 

 section. Beyond the point just specified, up to 18 feet from the entrance, 

 such fragments were rare, except in the uppermost Foot-level, where they 

 still abounded ; their place below being taken by a few pieces of red grit, 

 some of which were fossiliferous, whilst the Cave-earth became very sandy. 



From the first to the second Isifurcation of the Cave, as well as for a few 

 feet within each branch, the Cave-earth was no more than from 1 to 3-5 feet 

 deep, and rested on a continuous, but very uneven, limestone floor — an 

 instance, and probably the only one yet known in the Cavern, of this floor 

 being reached. 



In the northern branch the deposit was true Cave-earth throughout. In 

 the central one the Cave-earth contained a few pieces of Old Crystalline 

 Floor, and throughout the innermost 10 feet rested immediately on the old 

 dark red Breccia, found elsewhere in the Cavern beneath the Crystalline 

 Stalagmitic Floor. In the southern branch nothing but true Cave-earth was 

 found from the entrance to 8 feet within it ; but beyond that to the end, a 

 distance of 17 feet, from the base of the section to 2-5 and even 3 feet above 

 it, the entire accumulation was the old dark red Breccia, rock-like in its 

 cohesion, continuous from wall to wall, and clearly i?i situ. 



It may be well at this point to give a brief recapitulation of the facts as 

 they presented themselves in ascending, but not necessarily chronological, 

 order, in the same vertical section, in the central and southern branches : — 



First, or Lowest. Dark red rock -like Breccia, at least largely composed of 

 angular, subangular, and rounded fragments of Devonian grit, derivable 



1872. B 



