THE CATTEDOWN BONE CAVE. 
21 
When we speculate upon the manner in which the remains of 
the breccia found their way into the cavern, one hypothesis may 
at once be discarded. The cavity was not an open fissure, into 
which the animals might have fallen from the surface. Again, 
the bulk of the remains were those of animals which have nothing 
naturally to do with caves, and whose bodies must have been 
brought there by some agency external to themselves. 
There are three ways in which their presence may be accounted 
for. They may have been carried or dragged into the cavern by 
man ; or by some of the associated carnivora ; or they may have 
been washed thither by water. 
Now man would never have taken the trouble to drag beasts of 
chase into a subterranean larder, and throw them in a heap with 
carcases of beasts of prey, and the bodies of his own kith and 
kin : nor would he have conducted interments under such con- 
ditions. 
The hyaenas were the only associated carnivora capable of 
dragging the bodies in ; but had they done so, they must have 
voluntarily abandoned their intended feast, or have been prevented 
from reaping the reward of their industry. They never willingly 
left fairly complete skeletons behind them. Moreover, if we 
admit that they dragged in the oxen and deer, we must hold that 
they treated the human bodies in the same manner ! 
There is certainly evidence that the cavern was a haunt of 
carnivora at the time of the deposition of the breccia. Several 
days before remains of the hyaena were found, the condition of 
some of the fragmentary bones, which appeared to bear marks of 
gnawing, led me to suspect the proximity of that animal. And 
this, together with the presence of the lower jaw of a very young 
hyaena cub, which had not completed the cutting of its first set of 
teeth, and which cannot have gone far from the place of its birth, 
together with the existence of a small quantity of coprolite, may 
be held, I think, to show that a portion of the cavern at any rate 
was a hyaena den. 
I assume the same date and cause of deposit for all the remains 
in the stalagmitic-breccia. There was absolutely no difference in 
occurrence or condition between the human and the other bones. 
There was no trace of such intentional deposit of the former as 
must have accompanied the rudest act of burial. There was no 
matter of human handiwork, with the doubtful exception of 
