EEPOET ON THE EXPECTATION OE BEIXHAM CAVE. 
561 
wear and fracture. But as some of the fragments of stalagmite are rolled and some nearly 
angular, the test of wear or of angularity in distinguishing the older remains from those of 
more recent introduction becomes of no avail, as the disturbing cause has not produced a 
uniform result on materials, all of which must have been originally of the same character. 
The treading of the ground by the larger animals, the habit of hiding their spoil, or 
their search after spoil, and even the agency of man, whose presence here we shall 
presently show, may also have led to some displacement of the bones in a cave where 
they were lying loose on the lioor or only buried a slight depth in soft cave-earth. Thus, 
while on the one hand we see cause to believe that some of the bones may not be in 
their original position, yet on the other hand, in case of the bones occurring together, it 
does not follow (owing to causes we have before referred to) that because they differ in 
mineral character they are necessarily of a different age. It is evident that as other con- 
ditions besides those of age and imbedding, such as previous weathering or stalagmitic 
coating, influence the fossilization of the bones, it must be difficult to decide upon the 
limits of error to which such differences of condition may give rise. Though the fact of 
the variations in the state of the bones may be ascribed to several causes and does not 
vitiate the argument of antiquity, still it may be better to eliminate all such doubtful 
cases (and after all it is the general condition and aspect of the bulk of the remains 
upon which we must in the main depend), although the exceptions, even admitted, will 
be found to be so few as hardly to affect the main question at issue, whether as regards 
the actual or the relative age of the mammalian remains generally. 
This group of cave-animals may be referred to a late quaternary period, probably coeval 
with and prolonged beyond that of the raised beach which in places fringes the south 
coasts of England ; for mammalian remains of the same species have been found in the 
rubble beds which overly the raised beaches of Plymouth, Brighton, and elsewhere. 
We now have to consider another question sought to be settled by the exploration 
of this cave ; and although the antiquity of man has since been established on other 
grounds, this work must be ever considered as inaugurating, and as forming the first 
systematic attempt to solve, this important problem. 
Traces of Man's work . — Amongst the extraneous materials found in the Cave were 
thirty-six specimens of chalk flint (see Mr. Pengelly’s Table No. IV. p. 494)*, fifteen of 
which show unmistakable evidence of having been artificially worked, and are of forms 
which have their modern analogues in the stone knives, skin-scrapers, and pointed flakes 
used by uncivilized man, while one specimen (6, 8) is of that extinct large spear-head 
type so common in the high-level gravels of Amiens and other places. Fourteen of these 
specimens are described by Mr. Evans (see p. 549). There are nine others of which 
the workmanship is very rude or doubtful f, while there are seven which I think show 
* In Mr. Evans’s c Ancient Stone Implements ’ the numbers in column X. of Table IY. are used. In this 
Eeport the numbers in the first column are given. 
f These are marked by an asterisk; they are all from the shingle bed, except Xos. 14 and 18. 
4 F 2 
