140 
CAUSE OF ITS PECULIARITIES. 
they have probably fallen, but I could find no rolled pebbles. The 
upper portion of this earth seems to be mixed up with a quantity of 
calcareous loam, which, before it had been disturbed by digging, pro¬ 
bably formed a bed of diluvial sediment over the animal remains ; but, 
as we sink deeper, the earth gets blacker and more free from loam, 
and seems wholly composed of decayed animal matter. There is 
no appearance of either stalactite or stalagmite having ever existed 
within this cavern. 
In some of the particulars here enumerated, there is an apparent 
inconsistency with the phenomena of other caverns, but the dif¬ 
ferences are such as arise from the peculiar position and circumstances 
as the cave at Kiihloch: the absence of pebbles, and the presence of 
such an enormous mass of animal dust, are the anomalies I allude 
to; and both these circumstances indicate a less powerful action of 
diluvial waters within this cave than in any other, excepting Kirkdale. 
To these waters, however, we must still principally refer the intro¬ 
duction of the brown loam # , and the formation or laying open of the 
present entrance of the cavern : from its low position so near the bot¬ 
tom of the valley, this entrance could not have been exposed in its 
present state, and indeed must have been entirely covered under 
solid rock, till all the materials that lay above it had been swept 
away, and the valley cut down nearly to its present base; and as the 
cave ends inwardly in a cul de sac, and there is no vertical fissure, or 
any other mode of access to it, but by the present mouth, if we can 
find therein any circumstances that would prevent the admission of 
* A small quantity of this loam may possibly have been derived from dry dust that 
has fallen from the decomposition of the roof. 
