1S33.] found in the south of France. 635 



is of course in vain to seek in the most ancient histories of these coun- 

 tries for any tradition of the violent commotions which the crust of 

 the earth has endured (as is now proved), since man became its tenant. 

 Geology alone can seek to unravel the general facts in an uncertain thread of 

 events, through the gradual development of the records carefull v treasured 

 in caves and strata, and written in actual symbols of life of less equivocal 

 interpretation than Egyptian hieroglyphics. But the subject is yet new, 

 the facts limited, and we must be cautioned against coming to any con- 

 clusions without the most mature and impartial examination. It is to 

 this philosophic caution perhaps that we must attribute the silence of 

 Mr. Conybeare on so interesting atopic, in his report on geology to the 

 British Association in 1832. After alluding to Professor Buckland's 

 acute observatioms on the numerous bone caverns of England and Ger- 

 many, " which have thrown so much light on the particulars of the his- 

 tory of so many long-extinct races of animals, and proved beyond a 

 doubt that they were originally the inhabitants of the districts where 

 their remains are now found;" he briefly adds, "but still on many 

 questions connected with this curious and interesting subject, especially 

 the relative age of the human bones occasionally found in the same 

 cavern (as atBize in the South of France), we are bound to compare the 

 opposite views of De Serres, Christol, and Tournal, with those of 

 Buckland, with whom however Desnoyers appears entirely to agree." 



The last edition of Dela Beche's manual also barely alludes to the 

 fact of human bones having been lately found in the same mass 

 with the remains of the extinct rhinoceros and other animals usually 

 discovered in caverns. 



We have dwelt at some length on this novel subject, in hopes of draw- 

 ing the attention of our Indian geologists more zealously to prosecute 

 their investigation of the new field of organic remains now opened to 

 their labours in the clay of the Dodb and the banks of the Jamna. Should 

 it be proved that the bones of man are there really imbedded, and that 

 the animals found with him are (like the elephant of Jabalpur) of the 

 existing Asiatic rpecies, it will form a strong and very important link 

 of connection between the state of things at two distant epochs of our 

 globe, now distinguished as the recent and the fossil periods. 



In digging wells in the Dodb, or in any part of the upper Gangetic 

 plain, the search for fossil bones at considerable depths should not be 

 neglected, even under the strata of kankar, which occur almost every 

 where in the yellow clay. We might not despair even of finding bones 

 at the lowermost depth to which we have bored in Calcutta, for the 

 vellow clay under the blue alluvial beds contains kankar, and is of the 

 same apparent age as that of the Dodb. 3. P. 



