EE VIEWS. 



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cave yet filled to vrliicli it doubtless belongs, if we may judge from the fact 

 that it still continues to receive the winter streams of muddy water. This 

 hole is double, and each opening not more than a foot or eighteen inches 

 in diameter. 



" Or, again, there might have been anciently some lake in the vicinity 

 of this cave ... to which these animals resorted nightly to quench their 

 thirst, and bathe their unwieldy bodies. On its shores many would perish, 

 some from old age, some from weakness induced by long journeys, espe- 

 cially in times of drought ; the mud through which they had to struggle to 

 the life-giving wave would be too much for them ; they would be ' stagged,' 

 to use the common term applied to horses and cattle so circumstanced in 

 the lowlands of . . . Essex and elsewhere ; some would become the prey of 

 other animals. . . . Then, when the lake became enlarged by winter floods 

 . . . many of these bones might be forced into the cave, and so preserved. 



At the time this cave was first discovered, geology had not so far pro- 

 gressed as to suggest the probability of finding human remains, which 

 therefore were not noticed if present : neither did any flint weapons here 

 attract attention. 



" But when new opportunities of examining caves occur, as they are 

 likely to do at Caldy Island, and at Lydstep, the examination should be 

 conducted with much care, and reported with the greatest fidelity. Every 

 circumstance is worthy of note : human bones may be found deep 

 beneath the stalagmitic floor, and surrounded with the bones of extinct 

 animals ; but if it is forgotten that man in rude times was accustomed to 

 bury in such places, and the state of the soil and surface, whether dis- 

 turbed or otherwise, be not considered, of course false inferences will be 

 drawn. 



''As to the junction of Caldy with the mainland, it was distinctly re- 

 membered by old labourers twenty years ago, that at very low tides carts 

 used to cross from Griltar to St. idargaret's ; which latter island was con- 

 nected with Caldy in such a wa}^ as to be also reached by carts, if we may 

 infer as much from the remains of a road there. 



"The vale of St. Florence too, it may be worth recording, appears to 

 have recently undergone considerable changes of level. There is a place 

 on the hill-side, halfway up that ancient estuary, still bearing the name of 

 ' The Old Quay.' 



" Let us look around us as we stand on the Castle Hill — or rather think 

 what meets the eye of the mind from that elevation, at all points. How 

 many remains of terrestrial vegetation are exposed to view by the equi- 

 noctial tides all around the coast. They occur, for instance, at Caldy in 

 front, at Portclew to the right-hand, and at Amroth to the left ; indeedj 

 everywhere stumps and prostrate limbs of the oak and fir, not even greatly 

 altered in colour internally, are constantly to be seen ; together with the 

 remains of a thick growth of underwood, the hazel roots yet retaining 

 about their forks the very nuts that grew upon the branches. These can- 

 not be very old : the shore then must recently have sunk beneath the sea 

 in which these stumps stand rooted. Have we here the vestiges of those 

 ancient forests we were looking for just now, in which the animals roamedj 

 whose bones filled the caves we are describing ? And did such areas as 

 Broadmoor, and Kingsmoor, and some of the water-levelled valleys that 

 terminate in the sea hereabouts, form the beds of those great lakes and 

 rivers we were just now inquiring after, in which they wallowed ? One 

 thing is certain, that in dredging among these stumps in the bay the horns 

 of ancient deer, corresponding with those of the cave deposits, are found ; 

 as in like manner the teeth of elephants are frequently dredged up on the 



