R. H. Tiddeman — The Victoria Cave, Settle. 



11 



IV. — The Older Deposits in theYictoria Cave, Settle, Yorkshire. 



By R. H. Tiddeman, M.A., F.G.S. 

 rpHE following remarks were written for the Settle Caves Explora- 

 JL tion Committee in the spring of 1871. They were stibsequently 

 submitted to the British Association in 1872, and are, with additions 

 embodying the result of the latest explorations, offered to the scien- 

 tific public. First, I propose briefly to describe the beds with which 

 we have become acquainted in the course of the explorations, their 

 apparent range and superposition. Secondly, I will endeavour to 

 show to what natural causes they probably owe their origin. 



In doing so I need not give any description of the later deposits 

 from Neolithic times to the present, they having been fully treated 

 of by Mr, Dawkins.' I will merely remark that they are, so to 

 speak, unconformable to the other deposits, and are mixed up with 

 each of them in succession. In short, they form a floor or floors of 

 occupation unconformable to older beds below. 



1. The Cave is situated at the base of a vertical cliff of Carbonifer- 

 ous Limestone at the side of a dry valley, and the ground slopes away 

 steeply from the mouth, and is covered with talus. It lies at about 

 1450 feet above sea-level, and consists of three principal chambers. 

 Victoria Cave, Settle, Torkshiee. 

 (Scale, 1 inch to 54 feet.) 



A, Chamber A; B, Chamber B; 1, 25-foot shaft ; 2, 13-foot shaft; a, lower cave-earth; 

 a', bone-hed containing the older cave-mammals ; h, laminated clay ; h', glacial drift ; 

 c, upper cave-earth ; d, talus, the dotted line showing its upper surface previous to 

 the explorations. 



A. the Central Chamber, about 40 yards long ; its direction N.N.E. 



B. branches off from it on the left, and has a smaller continuation, 



C, which is not yet explored. 



D. lies on the right of A., and is entered from it near the mouth. 



The Limestone in which the Cave is excavated is a whitish-grey 

 massive rock ; it dips to the N.N.W. A. is excavated in the bed 

 which forms the roof of D., and B. in that which forms the roof of 

 A. It is probable that all these chambers are really one great 

 cavern, but filled with materials up to the inequalities in the roof 

 which now separates the different chambers. Its floor has never yet 

 been reached. 



1 Journal of the Anthropological Institute, 1871, and Eeport of the British Asso- 

 ciation for 1872. 



