564 



SCIENCE. 



[Vol. II., No. 38. 



the latter body, the exploration was placed under the 

 superintendence of Mr. (now Professor) Vrestwich 

 and myself, and, being the only resident member 

 of the committee, the actual superintendence fell of 

 necessity to me. 



The following facts connected with this cavern 

 were, no doubt, influential in leading to the decision 

 to have it explored : — 



1. It was a virgin cave which had been hermetically 

 sealed during an incalculably long period, the last 

 previous event in its liistory being the introduction 

 of a reindeer antler, found attached to the upper sur- 

 face of the stalagraitic floor. It was therefore free 

 from the objection, urged sometimes against Kent's 

 Cavern, that having been known from time imme- 

 morial, and up to 182.5 always open to all comers, it 

 had perhaps been ransacked again and again. 



2. It was believed, and it proved, to be a compar- 

 atively very small cavern; so that its complete ex- 

 ploration was not likely to require a large expenditure 

 of time or of money. 



It will be seen that the exploration was placed 

 liuder circum-itances much more likely to command 

 attention than any of those which had preceded it. 

 It was to be carried on under the auspices of the 

 Koyal and Geological societies by a committee con- 

 sisting of Mr S. H. Beckles, Mr. G. Busk, Rev. R. 

 Everest, Dr. H. Falconer, Mr. Godwin-Austen, Sir 

 C. Lyell, Professor Owen, Dr. J. Percy, Mr. J. Prest- 

 wich, Professor (now Sir A. C.) Ramsay, and myself, 

 — all fellows of the Geological society, and almost 

 all of them of the Royal society also. 



It was impossible not to feel, however, that the 

 mode of exploration must be such as would not 

 merely satisfy those actually engaged in the work, 

 but such as would command for the results which 

 might be obtained the acceptance of the scientific 

 world generally. Hence I resolved to have nothing 

 whatever to do with 'trial pits' here and there, or 

 with shafts to be sunk in selected places, but first to 

 examine and remove tlie stalagmite floor, then the 

 entire bed immediately below (if not of inconvenient 

 depth), horizontally throughout the entire length 

 of the cavern, or so far as practicable; this accom- 

 plished, to proceed in like manner with the next lower 

 bed ; and so on until all the deposits had been removed. 

 This method, uniformly followed, was preferable 

 to any other, because it would repeal the general 

 stratigraphical order of the deposits, with the amount 

 and direction of such ' dip ' as they might liave, as 

 well as any variations in the thickness of the beds; 

 it would afford tlie only chance of securing all the 

 fossils, and of thus ascertaining, not only the differ- 

 ent kinds of animals represented in tlie cave, but 

 also the ratios which the numbers of individuals 

 of the various species bore to one another, as well 

 as all peculiar or noteworthy collocations; it would 

 disclose the extent, character, and general features 

 of tlie cavern itself; it was undoubtedly the least 

 expensive mode of exploration; and it would render 

 it almost impossible to refer bones, or indications 

 of human existence, to wrong beds, depths, or asso- 

 ciations. 



The work was begun in July, 1S.')S, and closed at 

 the end of twelve months, when the cavern had 

 jjriictically been completely emptied. An oftioial re- 

 port was printed in the Philosopliical transactions 

 for 187:^: and all the specimens have been liandcd 

 over to the British museum. 



The paper on the subject mentioned at the begin- 

 ning of this address was read in September, 1858, 

 during the meeting of the association at Leeds, when 

 I had the pleasure of stating that eight flint tools 

 had already been found in various parts of the cav- 

 ern, all of them inosculating with bones of mam- 

 malia, at depths varying from nine to forty-two 

 inches in the cave-earth, on which lay a sheet of 

 stalagmite from three to eight inches thick, and hav- 

 ing williin it and on it relics of lion, hyena, bear, 

 mammoth, rhinoceros, and reindeer. 



It soon became obvious that the geological apathy 

 previously spoken of liad been rather apparent than 

 real. In fact, geologists were found to have been 

 not so much disinclined to entertain the (juesiion of 

 human antiquity as to doubt the iru-^tworlhiness of 

 the evidence which had previously been offered to 

 them on the subject. It was felt, moreover, that the 

 Brixham evidence made it worth while, and indeed 

 a duty, to re-examine that from Kent's Cavern, .as 

 well as that said to have been met with in river- 

 deposits in the valley of the Somme and elsewhere. 



The first-fruits, I believe, of this awakening, was a 

 paper by Mr. Prestwich, read to the Royal society, 

 May 26, 1859, on the occurrence of flint implemenls, 

 associated with the remains of animals of extinct 

 species in beds of a late geological period, — in 

 France at Amiens and Abbeville, and in England 

 at Hoxne {Phil, trans, for 1860, i)p. 277-317). This 

 paper contains explicit evidence that Brixham Cav- 

 ern had had no small share in disposing its author 

 to undertake the investigation, which added to his 

 own great reputation, and rescued M. Boucher de 

 Perthes from undeserved neglect. ''It was not," 

 says Mr. Prestwich, " until I had myself witnessed 

 the conditions under which these flint implements 

 had been found at Brixham, that I became fully 

 impressed with the validity of the doubts thrown 

 upon the previously prevailing opinions with respect 

 to such remains in caves " {Op. cit., 280). 



Sir C. Lyell, too, in his address to the geological 

 section of the British association, at Aberdeen, in 

 September, 1859, said, "The facts recently brought 

 to light during the systematic investigation, as re- 

 ported on by Dr. Falconer, of the Brixham Cave, 

 must, I think, have prepared you to admit that scep- 

 ticism in regard to the cave evidence in favor of the 

 antiquity of man liad previously been pushed to an 

 extreme" {Report Brit, assoc, 1859, trans, sects., p, 

 93). 



It is probably unnecessary to quote further to show 

 how very large a share the exploration at Brixham 

 had in impressing the scientific world generally with 

 the value and importance of the geological evidence 

 of man's antiquity. That impression, begun, as we 

 have seen, in 1858, has not only lasted to the present 

 day, but has probably not yet culminated. It has 



