ERA OF THE SUPERFICIAL FORMATIOnS. 



All of these speculations are as yet far too deficient in 

 facts, to be of much value ; and I must freely own that, 

 for one, I attach little importance to them. All that we 

 can legitimately infer from the diluvium is, that the north- 

 ern parts of Europe and America were then under the 

 sea, and that a strong current set over them. 



Connected with the diluvium is the history of ossiferous 

 caverns, of which specimens singly exist at Kirkdale, in 

 Yorkshire, Gailenreuth in Franconia, and other places. 

 They occur in the calcareous strata, as the great caverns 

 generally do, but have in all instances been naturally clo- 

 sed up till the recent period of their discovery. The 

 floors are covered with what appears to be a bed of the 

 diluvial clay, over which rests a crust of stalagmite, the 

 result of the droppings from the roof since the time when 

 the clay-bed was laid down. In the instances above spe- 

 cified, and several others, there have been found, under the 

 clay-bed, assemblages of the bones of animals, of many 

 various kinds. At Kirkdale, for example, the remains of 

 twenty-four species were ascertained — namely, pigeon, 

 lark, raven, duck, and partridge ; mouse, water-rat, rab- 

 bit, hare, deer, (three species,) ox, horse, hippopotamus, 

 rhinoceros, elephant, weazel, fox, wolf, bear, tiger, hyena. 

 From many of the bones of the gentler of these animals 

 being found in a broken state, it is supposed that the cave 

 was a haunt of hyenas and other predaceous animals, by 

 which the smaller ones were here consumed. This must 

 have been at a time antecedent to the submersion which 

 produced the diluvium, since the bones are covered by a 

 bed of that formation. It is impossible not to see here a 

 very natural series of incidents. First, the cave is fre- 

 quented by wild beasts, who make it a kind of charnel- 

 house. Then, submerged in the current which has been 

 spoken of, it receives a clay flooring from the waters con- 

 taining that matter in suspension. Finally, raised from 

 the water, but with no mouth to the open air it remains 

 unintruded on for a long series of ages, during which the 

 clay flooring receives a new calcareous covering from the 

 droppings of the roof. Dr. Buckland, who examined and 

 described the Kirkdale cave, was at first of opinion that it 

 presented a physical evidence of the Noachian deluge ; 

 but he afterwards saw reason to consider its phenomena 

 as of a time far apart from that event, which rests on evi 

 dence of an entirely different kind. 



