Search for Pleistocene Mammalia in Crete. 195 



A few days after arriving in Crete I rode out to the monastery 

 of Haghios Joannes in the hills beyond the rich and important 

 monastery of Haghia Triadha, Thence I walked down to the 

 ■ruined and deserted monastery of Katholiko, or Gouvernente, near 

 which is a cave which penetrates the side of the hill for a con- 

 siderable distance. A visit was also paid to the well-known Cave of 

 the Badger/ situated between the ruined monastery and that of 

 Haghios Joannes. This has a tiny chapel and garden at its entrance, 

 and consists of one large roomy chamber with a lofty roof. It con- 

 tains a remarkable tank naturally enclosed by stalagmite which 

 rises about eight or ten feet above the floor ; for a great part of the 

 year this is kept filled with delicious cold water which drips from 

 a large stalactite hanging from the roof. No traces of an ossiferous 

 deposit were found in either of these two caverns, and all enquiries 

 for others in the district were met by the negative, this being all the 

 more unfortunate as it caused me to cease investigations in the 

 immediate vicinity. 



It was not until the middle of July that I was shown and bought 

 from a man near Khania a small elephant tooth about which he 

 could, or would, give no information, except that it came from the 

 Akrotiri. After several fruitless expeditions a villager interrogated 

 at Khoridaki declared he knew of some petrified bones near the sea. 

 Joining him a couple of days later (the 22nd) I was guided by a lonely 

 hill path to Haghios Joannes, passing on the way the crumbling 

 ruins of an ancient monastery. The ponies being left in the cave 

 of Arkoudhes we walked down the hillside to Katholiko, which is 

 situated at the head of a precipitous-sided and narrow, winding 

 gorge. From here a scramble landed us in the dry stream-bed 

 below, which was followed to the sea. Then turning to the left 

 along the rocks at the foot of the clifi's a spot was soon reached 

 where a few fragments of bone were found still adhering to the 

 much weathered rock ; these no doubt indicate the position of 

 a former cave deposit, but otherwise are of little interest. 



Returning to the mouth of the gorge, where my guide refreshed 

 himself at a spring of mineral water much appreciated by the 

 natives, I was about to retrace my steps, when a shepherd who had 

 lately joined us volunteered to show me another deposit lying in 

 the opposite direction. He led us over very rough ground towards 

 Cape Maleka, just before reaching which we halted where the rocks 

 and overlying debris slope steeply down to the sea from within 

 a short distance of the top of the cliffs. This proved to be the site 

 of the deposit of which I was in search, and which is only a few 

 yards above the sea. No trace is left of the former cave walls, 

 while the ossiferous deposit has been largely destroyed, though, 

 judging from the fragmentary portions that remain, it must originally 

 have been of considerable extent. It being then late in the afternoon 

 a return was made the following day, when several portions of 

 molars and a fragment of a tusk of a pigmy elephant were with 



^ Or 'bear,' as it is sometimes translated. In this case the word used is 

 •' arkoudhes,' though the name usually employed in the island for badger is ' arkalos.' 



