128 
THE NATURALISTS’ JOURNAL. 
or palaeolithic era. He bases this conclusion on the much greater 
depth at which the skeleton was buried, coupled with the absence 
of any highly polished flints in its immediate neighbourhood. It 
may be mentioned that small flints are found so abundantly 
throughout the beds of earth which form the flooring of the cave 
that M. Bonfils has built a trophy of them in his museum in 
honour of the visit of the French Association for the Advancement 
of Science. The new skeletons were concealed by an overhang¬ 
ing ledge of rock and it was by the removal of this rock that they 
were brought to light. 
From the time of their discovery to the middle of April, the 
skeletons were left in situ in the cave with no protection beyond 
a few loose planks laid over them, and the bones must have 
suffered a great deal of injury from exposure to the air. A few 
days after our visit they were removed and the cave locked up, 
pending a lawsuit in which they literally became a “ bone of 
contention,” the quarryman, M. Riviere, the Prince of Monaco, 
and the Italian Government all having laid claim to the “ treasure 
trove.” The Prince has since then come out victor in this 
dispute. 
NOTES ON FUNGI. 
By Claude Morley. 
There is a wide-spread popular belief that, as soon as the 
sombre autumnal tints fade away, and the leaves which com¬ 
pose them are fallen, the country loses its charm for all save the 
sportsman and the agriculturalist; but this, together with 
numerous others, is also a popular error. Any one who has taken 
the trouble (or pleasure) to read a few even of those most 
interesting books and periodicals which are continually being 
printed, will know that nature has lost not one of her thousand 
charms, but simply hidden them away in some safe, quiet, and 
comparatively warm nook or cranny during the chill season of 
the year in order that they may be reissued the following spring 
in all their perfected beauty and grandeur. 
The fallen leaves, half buried by the action of the rain-water, 
which decends in more or less abundance about this time of the 
year, are very propitious for the birth of the various innumerable 
species of fungi, apparent to the eye of even the most casual 
observer. The origin of these fungi is both interesting and 
exceptional. Spores are detached from the parent plant and 
become buried in the earth, where, by reason of a great inherent 
power of nitrogen absorption, they increase in size, forming at 
first a single tube, afterwards branching out into a series of tubular 
