290 PKOCEEDINGS OF THE GEOLOQICAL SOCIETY. [May 22, 



cavern, became more and more evident as the exploration' pro- 

 gressed, since they had now become confused together in all local 

 collections and in the local notices of these caverns, none of the 

 writers having visited either cavern ; and thus all idea of their special 

 characters, as being probably indicative of two distinct geological 

 periods or conditions of the island, was lost sight of. 



Besides these relics of the Elephants, there were fragments of 

 the large and small bones of aquatic birds, namely two gigantic 

 Swans *, and of a Turtle, or Tortoise, — as also some few bones and 

 jaws of the Myoxus Melitensis found in the Crendi cavern, and 

 another species of Myoxus, figured by Dr. Carte in the * Trans- 

 actions ' of the Eoyal Dublin Society. 



IV. The Melliha Caveen. 



In the Spring of 1862 I was again so fortunate as to find the 

 vestiges of another bone-cave in Malta (namely, near the village of 

 Melliha, at the north end of the island), a report of the existence of 

 which had, however, been communicated to Lord Ducie and myself, 

 five or six years previously, by Mr. St. John, then Deputy Inspector 

 of Police ; but our efforts to find it at the time did not result success- 

 fully, as the discovery was made more than 20 years previously, and 

 but a few fragments of it had been seen by any one but the peasant 

 who found it and utilized its debris in the walls and terraces he 

 was constructing near the spot. But having in the early part of 

 1862 accidentally seen in the collection of local fossils made by 

 Signer Pace, of the Protestant College, a fragment of the tooth of a 

 Hippopotamus, which he had himself recently found in a wall under 

 the village of Melliha, I was induced to make further research and 

 inquiry at the locality for the above-mentioned ossiferous breccia. 

 Its position was at length shown to me, at about 200 yards to the 

 north of the church or chapel of Melliha, and in front of a cavernous 

 cliff that fringes the north crest of the hill there, at an elevation of 

 about 300 feet above the sea, the old chapel itself being partly 

 formed within one of these shallow caverns, which are all at about 

 the same level as the Crendi caverns, and were, no doubt, originated 

 by the same cause and at the same time, the present sea- shore under 

 the Melliha caverns being only from 200 to 300 yards distant from 

 them. Some of the caverns have been enlarged and utihzed as 

 stables ; and others were converted into rock habitations, or tombs, 

 by the ancient inhabitants of this part of Malta. 



The bone-breccia when originally discovered at Melliha was found 

 lying at a distance of from 15 to 20 feet and more in front of 

 one of these shallow caverns, thus showing that the roof of the 

 cavern must have extended beyond its present limits at the time 

 when the bones of the extinct Hippopotamus it contained wei-e 

 carried into it; also the breccia lying between two projecting 

 angles of the cliff is likewise an indication of the fact of the 

 former extension of the cavern beyond its present area, and of the 

 great antiquity of the cavern breccia in a geological point of view. 



* Described by Mr. W. K. Parker, F.K.S., Trans. Zool. Soc. vol. vi. p. 111. 



