DISCOVERED AT KIEKDALE. 
177 
of the stalactites and stalagmites in the cave ; some of which 
he supposes to have been formed prior to the occupation of 
the den by hyaenas, some during their residence there, and 
some after their destruction. He found, indeed, some sta- 
lagmites on the very floor of the cavern, and other portions 
spreading over the surface of the mud ; but, as in some 
places the covering of mud was very thin, and, in others, 
the w^ater, impregnated with calcareous matter, might find 
its way under the mud, instead of flowing on its surface, 
he had no right to conclude, that the one kind of stalag- 
mite was older than the other. Even the discovery of a 
slender stalactitic tube lying horizontally in the osseous 
breccia, does not show that there was stalactite in the cavern 
previous to the introduction of the bones ; for, during the 
subsidences and concussions of the strata, subsequent to 
the Deluge, a few slender tubes of stalactite might be sha- 
ken down from the roof, and fall among the bones. 
The assertion, that many of the bones bear marks of 
their having been gnawed by the hyaenas, is also unsup- 
ported by any decisive proof. Among the many hundreds 
of bones from the cavern, which I have examined, I have 
not observed one vestige of such gnawing, nor any marks 
of the action of teeth, save only of the teeth of Time. In 
conversing with Professor Buckland on this subject, when 
he visited Whitby, I found, that the bones which have 
curvatures in their fractured edges, are those which he 
considers as gnawed. But the bones might split and break 
in curved lines, as well as in straight ; and even where a 
fractured edge was originally straight, curved places might 
be produced in it, by its being repeatedly dashed against 
ledges of rock. 
No less fanciful is the Professor'^s idea, that the different 
states of decay in which the bones were found, indicate that 
they belonged to a succession of generations, or were de- 
VOL. VI, M 
