PLEISTOCENE CAVE-DEPOSITS. 97 



an ornamented bone bead, and three flint flakes — all of which are refer- 

 able to the Neolithic Age. 



3. Upper Cave -earth. — This is a buff- coloured, rather stiff clay, 

 abundantly charged with angular blocks and small fragments of limestone 

 and stalactite ; and here and there it contains beds of stalagmite. The 

 animal remains in this deposit were those of fox, grisly bear, brown bear, 

 badger, horse, pig, reindeer, red-deer, goat or sheep. 



4. Laminated Clay, thin at the entrance of the cave, but thickening 

 inwards to as much as twelve feet. It is worthy of note that glaciated or 

 ice-scratched boulders have been found embedded in it. 



5. Lower Cave-earth, having the same general character as the upper 

 bed. Its mammalian remains represent the following : hyaena, fox, badger, 

 brown bear, grisly bear, Elephas antiquus, Rhinoceros leptorhinus, hippopo- 

 tamus, Bos primigenius, bison, goat, red-deer. One bone met with in this 

 bed has given rise to much discussion. On its discovery it was identified 

 by Mr. Busk as a human fibula, and had its place of sepulture been Kent's 

 Cave, or indeed any cave but that in which it was found, perhaps 

 Mr. Busk's identification would never have been challenged. But as its 

 position in Victoria Cave implied, according to Mr. Tiddeman and others, 

 the existence of man in England before what is called the Ice Age or 

 Glacial Period, grave doubts have been thrown upon its human character ; 

 or, as Professor Bamsay remarks, " some eminent osteologists have lately 

 declared that though they cannot assert that the fragment is not part of 

 the bone of a man, on the other hand they cannot deny that it may just 

 as well be part of the fibula of a bear." x The former presence of man, 

 however, is apparently indicated by the discovery of certain bones which 

 look as if they had been hacked by some instrument. 



I have said that the cave-earths and intervening laminated 

 clay occnr inside the Victoria Cave, while the overlying Neolithic 

 and Eomano-Celtic layers were fonnd just at the entrance, rest- 

 ing partly on the older deposits, and partly on a talus of debris 

 that obscures the truncated ends of the true Pleistocene beds. 

 When this talus of blocks and rubbish, which had fallen down 

 from the cliff and concealed the entrance to the cave, had been 

 cleared away, it was found to rest upon a peculiar deposit 

 called " glacial drift," of which I shall have much to say in the 

 sequel. From its position it was evident that this "glacial drift" 

 was of younger date than the lower cave-earth, and was probably 

 connected in its origin with the overlying laminated clay. 



1 Physical Geology and Geography of Great Britain. 5th edition, p. 466. 



