172 The Rev . Mr, Buckland’s account of Fossil Teeth and 
diluvium , it may be necessary to premise, that I apply it to 
those extensive and general deposits of superficial gravel, 
which appear to have been produced by the last great con- 
vulsion that has affected our planet ; and that with regard to 
the indications afforded by geology of such a convulsion, I 
entirely coincide with the views of M. Cuvier, in considering 
them as bearing undeniable evidence of a recent and transient 
inundation.* On these grounds I have felt myself fully 
justified in applying the epithet diluvial , to the results of this 
great convulsion, of antediluvial , to the state of things im- 
mediately preceding it, and postdiluvial, or alluvial , to that 
which succeeded it, and has continued to the present time. 
In detailing these observations I propose, first, to submit 
a short account of the geological position and relations of the 
rock in which the cavern alluded to is situated ; to proceed, 
in the next place, to a description of the cavern itself ; then 
to enter into that which will form the most important part of 
this communication, a particular enumeration of the animal 
remains there inhumed, and the very remarkable phenomena 
with which they are attended ; to review the general in- 
ferences to which these phenomena lead ; and conclude with 
a brief comparative account of analogous animal deposits in 
other parts of this country, and the Continent. 
Kirkdale is situated ( as may be seen by reference to the 
* Analogous evidences to the same point, collected in this country from the state 
of the gravel beds and vallies in the midland parts of England, have recently been 
published by myself in a Paper on the Lickey Hill, in the second part of the fifth 
Volume of the Geological Transactions, and in the Appendix to an Inaugural Lec- 
ture I published at Oxford, in 1820. Another Paper of mine on similar evidences 
afforded by the vallies that intersect the coast of West Dorset and East Devonshire, 
will be published in the first part of the sixth Volume of the Geological Transactions. 
