554 



REMAINS OF EXTINCT QUADRUPEDS IN SILURIA. 



ticular clefts of the rock 1 , but I pass on with the remark, that this example in the very 

 heart of Siluria, is all that can be desired to prove, that like other parts of England, 

 this tract was inhabited by wild animals whose species are now extinct 2 . I would 

 further observe, that there are also true caverns, in which the remains of extinct animals 

 may probably hereafter be found, such as Ippikin's Rock 3 , in Wenlock Edge (p. 212.), 

 the great cavern of the Nash Scar Limestone, near Presteign (p. 314 and note). 



That quadrupeds of extinct species inhabited this region, is further proved by the 

 contents of certain gravel heaps on its eastern limits. In a pit south of Eastnor Castle, 

 where the fragments consist exclusively of Silurian rocks and syenite of the adjacent hills, 

 the remains of the elephant and other animals have been found ; and at Fleet's Bank, 

 near Sandlin, the bones of the rhinoceros and ox 4 . The first-mentioned locality is in 

 the midst of a Silurian group of rocks, the other at the foot of the eastern slope of the 

 Caradoc sandstone of Old Storridge Hill, and about 50 feet above a little stream. 

 At both places the gravel is exclusively derived from rocks in the immediate vicinity ; 

 and as neither deposit contains a fragment of far transported rock, we have a right 

 to infer, that certain extinct species of elephant, rhinoceros, ox, and deer, for- 

 merly ranged over Siluria. The bones of the same animals are also found at Powick, 

 Bromwich Hill, and other places near the town of Worcester, amid similar local detritus, 

 mixed with a considerable proportion of the northern drift, together with the sea shells 

 of existing species to which we have before alluded. There can, consequently, be little 

 doubt that while Siluria, as before inferred, was above the sea, and a portion of the 

 valley of the Severn was under it, the adjacent lands were inhabited by quadrupeds of 

 extinct species, whose remains have in some cases been preserved in purely local, 

 rluviatile and lacustrine deposits, and in others were the marine accumulations of the 

 strait or estuary into which they had been drifted. 



Remains of extinct species of Quadrupeds in ancient fluviatile deposits. 



Having shown that the western shore of the submarine tract of the Vale of Worcester 

 was formed by the Abberley and Malvern Hills, we have now to offer still more con- 

 vincing proofs of the existence of land upon the east, by pointing out a local drift, 



1 See Dr. Buckland's ingenious explanation of such collections of bones, Reliq. Diluv. p. 56., and Bridgew. 

 Treat, vol. i. p. 94. ; De la Beche's Geol. Man. p. 201, &c. 



2 The Rev. T. T. Lewis procured the femur of a stag from the gravel of Leominster. 



3 My young friend Mr. Evans, of Kingsland, partially examined, at my request, the cavern at Ippikin's Rock ; 

 but although he found in it layers of alluvial deposit, he did not detect organic remains. He was, however, 

 unprovided with sufficient assistance to make that thorough examination, which will I trust be completed, 

 through the labours of the Ludlow Natural History Society, the nearest scientific body to the spot in question, 



* The latter were found by Mr. J. Allies, who has also collected the bones of the horse, rhinoceros, 

 elephant, &c. at Powick, and those of a rhinoceros at Bromwich Hill, near Worcester. 



