510 OSSIFEROUS CAVES OF GOWER. 



No coprolites of Hyaena were encountered, nor bone splin- 

 ters bearing teeth marks, nor detacbed molars of Equus. 

 ' Mincbin Hole,' from tbese negative results, does not appear 

 to bave been mucb frequented as a Hysena's den, although 

 some of the bones bear distinct marks of gnawing ; these are 

 very pronounced upon the astragalus and condyles of the 

 femur of a Ehinoceros ; while the lower jaw of a fcetal Ele- 

 phant presents superficial grooving, as if gnawed by a Wolf 

 rather than by a Hyaena. 



The remarkable state of integrity in which the two large 

 skulls of Rhinoceros hemitoechus were discovered is not a little 

 significant. They bore no marks of having been dragged in 

 by any predaceous animal ; and it is hardly conceivable that 

 they would have been precipitated from a fissure above, with- 

 out being fractured into many pieces, considering the great 

 height of the roof. It is equally improbable that the ani- 

 mals were at any time alive in the cavern, for from the 

 difficult nature of the approach it could never have been 

 accessible to large Pachyderms like Rhinoceros and Elephas. 

 The two crania were embedded in marine sand, at the 

 bottom of the deposits ; and under all the circumstances, it 

 seems most probable that they were drifted in by the waves, 

 althoiigh it is difficult even then to understand how they 

 could have escaped without injury or marks of rolling. 



8. ' Bosco's Den ' Cavern, upper story. 



I now pass to the consideration of another series of caverns, 

 or cavernous fissures, of very high interest, arising not so. 

 much from the abundance and importance of the organic 

 remains contained in them, as from the nature and succes- 

 sion of their marine and alluvial deposits, and from the flood 

 of light which they throw upon the emergence of the caverns 

 above the sea, the manner of their filling up by transported 

 materials, and the proofs of subsidence within a compara- 

 tively modern period, wbich they unfold. The merit of the 

 discovery of this series belongs wholly and solely to Colonel 

 Wood. Some of the localities, indeed, were known to the 

 quarrymen who resort to the cliffs, by vague and uncertain 

 names ; others bore no designation whatever, and the names 

 which will be cited in the sequel are, with a single exception, 

 those which have been either applied to them or adopted by 

 Colonel Wood. I must premise further, that the value of 

 any reasoning upon alleged proofs of subsidence must ne- 

 cessarily depend much upon the reliability of exact hypso- 

 metrical data, as to the relation of the level of the sinking or 

 sunk deposits to the mean level of the adjoining sea. Obser- 



