CAYES AND THEIR OCCUPANTS. 
381 
Arctic animals was hunted by the ancient cave-dwellers as far 
south as the Pyrenees. Contemporary with these animals was 
the great Irish elk ( Cervus megaceros). This huge deer, the 
remains of which are not unfrequent in caves, had also a wide 
range, from Ireland and England, through France, Germany, 
and Central Italy. The bones of several individuals, one of 
them being of unusually large size, were found at Creswell. 
One of the most abundant animals, the bones of which 
were found in the Creswell caves, were those of the small Pleis- 
tocene horse, and it would doubtless have formed a staple 
article of food, not only to the hyaenas and other carnivora 
whose teeth-marks are so common on its bones, but also to the 
early cave men, who did not share the prejudice or superstition 
against the use of horseflesh which prevailed in later times. 
No trace of the musk ox, which is not uncommon elsewhere, has 
been found in these caves, although it may have been an inhabi- 
tant of the neighbourhood. The animals which it is perhaps 
the most difficult for us to realize as having been contemporaries 
with man in England, are the woolly rhinoceros (R. tichorhinus) 
and the mammoth ( Elephas primigenius). Yet few facts are 
more certain than that primeval man must have constantly 
encountered these creatures as he went out on his hunting 
expeditions. Three species of rhinoceros inhabited England 
during the Pleistocene period. The one most frequently met 
with is the two-horned woolly rhinoceros, which, besides being 
hairy, like the mammoth, had also a smooth skin, contrasting 
in this with the existing species with its thickly-folded covering. 
It was apparently fitted to undergo a far severer climate than 
any of its living relatives. Its remains are found very widely 
spread ; some are imbedded in the frozen mud of the Lena in 
Siberia, and from caves and gravel beds over a large part of 
Europe its bones have been obtained ; these as well as teeth 
found in the Creswell caves show that this animal was plentiful 
in the neighbouring country, and the gnawed condition of its 
bones shows that it fell a frequent prey to the hyaenas, whilst a 
large number of milk teeth found show that many young 
individuals were present. This was also the case with the next 
animal to be noticed, the mammoth. All three of the caves 
explored at Creswell have yielded teeth and bones of the mam- 
moth, some of the former being from adults, but very many 
were milk teeth : this is what we should naturally expect, as 
it is hardly likely that hyaenas would often obtain the mas- 
tery of the full-grown animal unless it happened to be maimed 
or otherwise enfeebled. The mammoth, with its shaggy hair 
and huge recurved tusks, was doubtless, like the woolly rhino- 
ceros, capable of enduring great extremes of cold ; its remains 
have also been found frozen at the Lena in so fresh a condition 
