J. Wilfrid Jackson — Lynx in Wales and Derby. 259 



VI. — On the Occurrence of the Lynx in North Wales and 

 Derbyshire. 



By J. Wilfrid Jackson, E.G. S., Manchester Museum. 



ON looking over a miscellaneous collection of animal bones from 

 a cave in North Wales, sent to me for identification by 

 Mr. John H, Morris, of West Bromwich, I was pleased to discover 

 the remains of the lynx, and as our knowledge of the occurrences of 

 this animal in the British Isles is so scanty, it seems to me to be of 

 some interest to record the present discovery. 



Hitherto remains of this creature have only been recorded from 

 a few places in this country. It was first discovered about 1866 in 

 a fissure, termed the Yew-tree Cave, in Pleasley Vale, on the borders 

 of Nottinghamshire and Derbyshire, the remains consisting of a right 

 ramus of a lower jaw and the hinder part of a skull.' Fourteen years 

 later two bones, a humerus and a metatarsal, were met with in 

 a fissure in Teesdale, Durham, and were described by Mr. William 

 Davies.* In 1897 its remains were met with in fair quantity, by 

 Mr. W. Storrs Fox, in a cave in Gales Dale, Derbyshire,^ while the 

 most recent record appears to be that of the Eev. E. H. Mullins, who 

 gives it in his list of animals found in Langwith Cave, near Mansfield.* 



The North Wales cave, the site of the present discovery, is situated 

 some two and a quarter miles to the south-east of Prestatyn and is 

 known asGop, or Newmarket, Cave. It is the same cave from which 

 Professor Dawkius obtained the remainsof the hyaena, bison, reindeer, 

 woolly rhinoceros, etc., as well as domestic animals, pottery, and 

 human bones, indicating that the cave had been used at a later period 

 both for habitation and burial purposes.* 



Displacement of stalactitic matter behind the area explored by 

 Professor Dawkius revealed the presence of a continuation of the cave 

 in the form of low tunnel from which other tunnels strike off to the 

 right and left. The one on the left leads back to the cliff where an 

 entrance has at some remote period been artificially closed by a barrier 

 of limestone. 



The discovery of these further passages led to explorations being 

 made by Mr. John H. Morris, Lieut.-Colonel T. A. Glenn, and others, 

 in 1912, with the result that several other remains, both animal and 

 liuman, were met with in digging into the cave-floor in different 

 places. 



Amongst the animal bones sent to me for examination I have been 

 able to identify those of the bison, bear, badger, fox, wolf, roe, stag, 

 horse, hare, ox, sheep, pig, domestic fowl, coot, etc., as well as the 

 lynx, as mentioned above. 



The bison and bear are each represented by one bone only, in the 

 former case by a left magnum, and in the latter by an imperfect 

 left humerus wanting both extremities. As to the species of the 



1 W. Boyd Dawkins, Brit. Pleist. Mam. (Pal. See), i, p. 172, 1869. 



- Wm. Davies, Geol. Mag., 1880, p. 346. 



^ W. Storrs Fox, Proc. Zool. See., i, p. 65, 1906. 



* Journ. Derbyshire Archseol. and Nat. Hist. Soc, vol. xxxv, p. 150, 1913. 



® Dawkins, Archseol. Journ., Iviii, pp. 322-41, 1901. 



