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that, like the cave at Brixham, it was visited, and occasionally 
tenanted, during the time of the Romans, who had a station 
hard by on the down above Babbicombe. Mr. M'Enery 
was at first inclined to think that the human bones and the 
flint implements, through all depths, were contemporaneous ; 
but he subsequently abandoned that opinion, and the final 
result of his researches is the classification of the deposits 
in the following order, proceeding downward : — near the 
surface, black pottery, with traces of the lathe, beads, and 
bone pins, and other articles belonging to the British or 
Romano-British periods ; lower down, arrows, spear heads, 
and stone axes, among fossil teeth and bones of herbivorous 
and carnivorous animals, but no pottery nor other work 
of art ; lowest of all, the diluvial bed, containing merely 
animal remains, with the exception of the flints at its upper 
surface. 
Such are Mr. M'Enery's statements respecting the suc- 
cession of deposits in the cave and his inferences from it. 
It must not be concealed, however, that a geologist of 
eminence, Mr. Austen, in a Memoir in the 6th volume of 
the " Transactions of the Geological Society/ ' gives an 
entirely different result of his researches. He says, " Human 
remains and works of art, such as arrow heads and knives of 
flint, occur in all parts of the cave, and throughout the entire 
thickness of the clay, and no distinction founded on the 
condition, distribution, or relative position, can be observed 
whereby the human can be separated from the other relics." 
Mr. Austen also thinks that the bones of the elephant and 
rhinoceros were washed into the cave, along with the flint 
implements, from no great distance ; remains of these animals 
being found in many of the valleys of South Devon. These 
discrepancies render it particularly desirable that a fresh 
examination should be made by men free from preconceived 
opinions on either side. Another cave in the same district, 
