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Natural-Historical Collections. 215 
_ A locality for manganese, situated at Romanéche, near Macon, has attracted 
the. attention of many geologists. _Dolomieu, who visited it in 1796, considered 
it to be neither a bed nor a vein, but a sort of mass, immediately superimposed 
upon the granite; other observers thought that it was a strong granitic vein. Ac- 
cording to some new researches made by M. de Bonnard, the mineral would 
combine in itself both of these characters. 
Many caverns, where no bones had been discovered, had been found to contain 
them, since Professsor Buckland remarked the situation which they generally 
occupy, and the method which one ought to follow in seeking for them. 
Last year we spoke of the cave of Oselles, near Besangon, and of that of Eche- 
noz, near Vesoul. 
M. Delanoue has observed, in a cave at Miremont, department of Dordogne, 
a new example of the astonishing constancy of thisphenomenon. This cave seems 
to be formed in an intermediate series between the chalk and the jura limestone. 
Its galleries extend to upwards of 2000 paces, and terminate in a multitude of 
strait and low ramifications, which have furnished many bones. A red clay en- 
velopes them ; and they are principally the bones and teeth of bears. Examina- 
tions made at 200 and 400 paces from the opening, underneath different beds of 
marl, which appear to be much newer than red clay, have led to the discovery of 
fragments of pottery similar to those which are found in some ruins, and in the 
alluvial beds, and which we refer to an epoch when the Roman arts were not yet 
introduced amongst the Gauis. 
More recently, one of the caverns discovered at Bize, department of Aude, has 
been the object of investigation by M. Tournal, apothecary at Narbonne. [Iz is 
in the jurassic series ; many of its bones are enveloped in a stony concretion, and, 
according to the author, belong to extinct species, already described from this 
kind of caverns ; the others are in a black mud, and differ entirely from the former. 
M. Tournal adds, that there are human bones, and fragments of pottery, not 
only in the black mud, but in the calcareous concretions, where they are mixed 
with the remains of extinct species. 
M. Destrem, engineer of bridges and roads, who has examined the same cavern, 
has found the bones of ruminants only, principally of the genus cervus, and 
some debris of rabbits and birds. He-aifirms that the human bones do not merit 
any Serious attention; they are neither impregnated with clay, nor coated with 
the ferruginous crust which surrounds the truly fossil bones. Finally, M. Destrem 
regards them as deposited at recent epochs in these caverns, where it is known that 
malefactors have frequently retired. 
There is nothing extraordinary in these facts. One may, indeed, conceive, 
that since the period when the animals, whose remains principally form the 
floor of these caverns, were destroyed, others may have been introduced; and 
were they even encrusted with the former, it is natural that the stalagmite, which 
is incessantly forming, should have promiscuously enveloped them. M. Buckland 
has found, in a cavern in Glamorganshire, a skeleton of a woman almost entire, 
and bearing evidence of not having lain there for any very great length of time. 
We ourselves have observed, in the osseous breccia which fills certain fissures in the 
rock of Nice, a human upper jaw, already clothed with a thin coat of stalagmite. 
MM. Marcel de Serres, Dubreuil, and Jean-Jean, professors at Montpellier, 
have commenced the publication of a description of the caverns of Lunel-Vieil, 
long celebrated for the abundance and variety of the bones which they contain. 
Another locality, very rich in fossil bones, exists at Auvergne, in a mountain 
near the Issoire, department of Puy-de-Dome, and has been explored with as 
much ability as emulation, on the one hand by MM. Devéze de Chabriol and 
Bouillet, and on the other, by MM. Abbe Croisat and Jobert. 
Since it has been determined that the animal population of different climates 
has undergone changes, attested by the remains which they have left in the beds . 
of which the envelope of the globe is formed, and since we have known that at 
certain epochs the.reptiles prevailed, and at others, the pachydermatous mammi- 
