58 
CAVE OF HUTTON IN MENDIP, 
it continued to the depth of eight yards, and then opened into a 
cavern about twenty feet square, and four high; the floor of this cave 
consisted of good ochre, strewed on the surface of which were mul¬ 
titudes of white bones, which were also found dispersed through the 
interior of the ochreous mass. In the centre of this chamber, a large 
stalactite depended from the roof; and beneath, a similar mass rose 
from the floor, almost touching it: in one of the side walls was an 
opening about three feet square, which conducted through a passage 
eighteen yards in length, to a second cavern, ten yards in length, and 
five in breadth; both the passage and cavern being filled with ochre 
and bones. Another passage, about six feet square, branched off 
laterally from this chamber about four yards below its entrance; this 
continued nearly on the same level for eighteen yards; it was filled 
with rubbly ochre, fragments of limestone rounded by attrition, and 
lead ore confusedly mixed together; many large bones occurring in 
the mass; among which four magnificent teeth of an elephant (the 
whole number belonging to a single skull) were found. Another shaft 
was sunk from the surface perpendicularly into this branch, and ap¬ 
pears to have followed the course of a fissure, since it is said that all 
the way nothing appeared but rubble, large stones, ochre, and bones: 
in the second chamber, immediately beyond the entrance of the branch 
just described, there appeared a large deep opening, tending per¬ 
pendicularly downwards, filled with the same congeries of rubble, 
ochre, bones, &c.; this was cleared to the depth of five yards; this 
point, being the deepest part of the workings, was estimated at about 
thirty-six yards beneath the surface of the hill: a few yards to the 
