376 
POPULAR SCIENCE REVIEW. 
many in the adjoining caves. This, however, is what might 
be expected ; the larger and more commodious caves would 
certainly have been preferred to the narrow fissure, by the early 
inhabitants, for a house or sheltering-place. When we come to 
notice the animal remains we shall find but little difference in 
the contents of these caves, the presence or absence of some 
species in one or other of them being evidently accidental. The 
two larger caves, the Eobin Hood and the Church Hole, were 
found to contain a considerable thickness of deposited material ; 
and a reference to the sections (figs. 2, 3) will serve to show how 
the floors of bone caves are built up. Sealed up under a crust of 
stalagmite and breccia a series of well-marked beds were found. 
This stalagmitic breccia consisted of masses of limestone fallen 
from the roof, and cemented together during the lapse of an 
indefinite period of time by the constant dripping of water 
charged with carbonate of lime. Below the breccia was a 
deposit of sandy earth, commonly known as cave earth, of 
variable thickness, and passing at its base into a curiously 
mottled bed of reddish earth, filled with light-coloured frag- 
ments of friable limestone ; this in its turn rested on red sand, 
similar to that mentioned as occurring in the Pin Hole, and 
under this was the decomposed floor of the cavern, the whole 
amount of deposited materials being about eight or nine feet 
thick. It may be observed that the contents of the Eobin 
Hood and Church Hole caves were very similar to each other, 
and were probably brought in at the same period under identical 
conditions. 
It is in these various beds, forming the floors of the caves, 
that the bones and implements have been obtained which enable 
us to reconstruct the life-history of the past. 
Commencing our researches in the surface-deposits in the Church 
Hole and the Eobin Hood caves, we are at once carried back 
into that unsettled period of British history when the Eoman 
legions were withdrawn, and the comparatively civilized British 
population had to resist as best they might the hordes of Teuton 
invaders, for in the surface soil of these caves a few traces of 
Eomano-British art have been met with : these consisted of two 
or three harp-shaped and circular brooches, one of the former 
being enamelled with blue. In conjunction with these, nume- 
rous fragments of pottery, one or two being of the well-known 
red Samian ware, were found ; and the surface-soil also con- 
tained a large number of bones of animals common at that 
time, such as the sheep, goat, Celtic shorthorn, stag, wild cat, 
badger, fox, and horse. 
Previous to this post-Eoman occupation of the caverns, there 
seems to occur a long blank period, as far as man, at any rate, 
is concerned ; for no distinct traces of Neolithic times have been 
