116 NO BONES IN THE ROOF OR SIDES, ABOVE THE MUD. 
in great part made up of bones ; (see Plate XIV. h ;) but not a particle 
of bone occurs adhering to the roof or sides of the great chamber (b) 
above the level of its floor *. 
There are several artificial excavations similar to that represented 
at h, in one of which I found the head of a large bear, from which 
the upper part of the skull had been broken off, and a pebble lay im¬ 
bedded in mud in the cavity of the skull f. Close to it was an under 
jaw, (possibly of the same animal,) and both were surrounded with 
mud, pebbles, and bones, the latter exceeding in proportion both the 
former: they were so firmly packed together, that with a small ham¬ 
mer and chisel, I could advance but slowly in extracting them ; but, 
with proper instruments, cart-loads of bones might easily be obtained. 
Whilst working on this mass, I could not help imagining that I was 
in the cavernous fissure at Plymouth, so precisely analogous were all 
the circumstances before me to those I had there witnessed, as to the 
manner and matrix in which the bones were packed together, and 
the difficulty of unpacking without destroying them. Their state of 
* I dwell more on this circumstance than I should have otherwise thought neces¬ 
sary, because preceding writers on this subject have overlooked the important distinc¬ 
tion I am now drawing, and have stated the occurrence of bones in the roof and sides 
in such general terms, that persons who have not themselves carefully inspected the 
caverns with a view to this particular point may conclude from their descriptions that 
the bones are found indiscriminately adhering to the sides and roof of the upper cham¬ 
bers, as well as of the lower vaults, which is not the fact. 
f In another skull from this cave, which was given me by Professor Blumenbach, 
the cavities of the brain and nose are entirely filled up with the same kind of brown mud: 
and in a third which I found at Gailenreuth, the cavity of the brain contains half a dozen 
fragments of stone cemented together by calc sinter. These specimens I have deposited 
in the Museum at Oxford, together with a complete series of bones, &c.; illustrating all 
the most important phenomena mentioned in this work, as occurring in the caves of 
Germany, as well as in those of England. 
