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have been well described by Mr. Denny, in the Report of the 
proceedings of the Geological and Polytechnic Society for 
1859. Objects of the same description were found, with the 
addition in one of the caves of bones of the wolf, the hyaena, 
and the cave tiger, but the remains of these animals, long 
extinct in our islands, were very few. It is curious that, in 
most of these caves yet explored, the objects found which 
come under the examination of the antiquary, of which the 
date can be given, belong to nearly the same age, although 
mixed to a small degree with works of ruder make, such as 
stone implements. Two years ago, a certain number of 
manufactured objects found in a similar cave at Heathery 
Burn, near Stanhope, in Durham, were exhibited before the 
Ethnological Society of London, and such of these fragments, 
for they were but fragments, as had preserved their original 
form, were easily recognised as Roman work, and as 
resembling those which are found among the remains of a late 
part of the Roman period. Similarly, the objects in bronze 
found in Kent's Hole, near Torquay (in Devonshire), were, I 
believe, all late Roman. And I have no doubt that other 
similar examples might be added. Now, from these facts — 
for they are facts — I conclude that the time when people 
resorted to these caves was that of the turbulence and con- 
fusion which marked the decline of the Roman power, and 
the equally turbulent period which immediately succeeded it. 
With our entire ignorance of the exact state of society 
during that period, it would be idle to attempt to give a 
reason for this resort, and, therefore, to assign a merely con- 
jectural cause for their having been frequented at any 
particular period, is absurd. The passion for conjecturing, 
without sufficient knowledge, has been the bane of archaeo- 
logical science during the past age. I must, however, urge 
that the circumstance of finding in these caves evidence of 
their having been resorted to at a late date entirely cuts 
