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Note on the Osseous Breccia and Deposit in the Caves of Billa Soorgum, 

 Lat. 15° 25', Long. 78° 15', Southern India. By Captain Newbold. 



These caves are situated in hills composed of the diamond limestone, 

 and had not hitherto, as far as I can discover, been visited by any Euro- 

 pean previous to my stumbling upon them. From the roofs of some 

 depend clusters of stalactites, while the sides and floor are encrusted with 

 stalagmite, covered with an ammoniacal and nitrous soil of little speci- 

 fic gravity, brown in colour, and apparently the result of decomposition 

 of the filth of bats and other small animals that lurk in the recesses. 



The mouths of the caves are from 46 to 60 feet high ; but diminish 

 before many feet are traversed to semi-circular channels, or fissures of no 

 great length, which it is necessary to traverse on hands and knees. 



Among the specimens sent, will be found a gypseous bone breccia, a 

 red indurated marl or mud, somewhat resembling that of the celebrated 

 Kirkdale caverns in Yorkshire, some fossilized bones of small animals 

 with a few fragments of the bones and tusks of animals of larger dimen- 

 sions, many of which were found at the depth of 18 feet below the floor 

 of the caves, imbedded confusedly in a hard gypseous rock and in red 

 mud, lying under a crust of stalagmite, which is covered by the light 

 animal soil before-mentioned. 



I am sorry I cannot send the Society duplicates of the more perfect 

 bones and tusks of the larger animals, which I have reserved for exami- 

 nation in Europe. The bones are broken, but not water- worn : those 

 of the smaller animals are in great quantities. 



The specimens now presented, poor and insignificant as they are, 

 may be regarded with some interest as the first offerings on the Society's 

 table from the caves of Southern India, of a deposit analogous in mineral 

 composition, under a similar crust of stalagmite, to that in which Buck- 

 land first discovered some of the then most remarkable of his Religucs, 

 which consisted of the remains of about 300 hyaenas, the ox, young 

 elephants, hippopotamus, rhinoceros, horse, bear, wolf, hare, water rat, 

 and several birds : with the dung of hyaenas nearly hard as bone, and 

 composed principally of the same substance, phosphate of lime, all con- 

 fusedly mixed in a loam or mud, or dispersed through the crust of 

 stalagmite which covers it. 



