Chapter XIV: Part 14

3. ELEPHAS PRIMIGENIUS, Blum, or MAMMOTH.--_The Elephant with elongated skull, concave forehead, very long alveolæ for the tusks, the lower jaw obtuse, the grinders broader, parallel, marked with closer bands_, which we name the _Fossil Elephant_ (_Elephas primigenius_, Blum.), is the _Mammoth_ of the Russians. Its bones are only found in the fossil state. No person has seen in a fresh state bones resembling those by which this species is peculiarly distinguished, nor have the bones of the two preceding species been seen in the fossil state.[431] Its bones are found in great number in many countries, but in better preservation in the north than elsewhere. It resembles the Indian more than the African species. It differs, however, from the former in the grinders, in the form of the lower jaw, and many other bones, but especially in the length of the alveolæ and tusks. This last character must have singularly modified the figure and organisation of its proboscis, and given it a physiognomy much more different from that of the Indian species, than might have been expected from the similarity of the rest of their bones. It appears that its tusks were generally large, frequently more or less spirally arcuate, and directed outwards. There is no proof that they differ much according to differences of sex or race. The size was not much greater than that to which the Indian species may attain; it appears to have been still clumsier in its proportions. It is already manifest from its osseous remains, that it was a species differing more from the Indian, than the ass from the horse, and the jackal and isatis from the wolf and fox. It is not known what had been the size of its ears, or the colour of its skin; but it is certain that, at least, some individuals bore two sorts of hair, namely, a red, coarse, tufted wool, and stiff black hairs, which, upon the neck and along the dorsal spine, became long enough to form a sort of mane. Thus, not only is there nothing impossible in its having been able to support a climate which would destroy the Indian species, but it is even probable that it was so constituted as to prefer cold climates. Its bones are generally found in the alluvial and superficial strata of the earth, and most commonly in the deposits which fill up the bottom of valleys, or which border the beds of rivers. They scarcely ever occur by themselves, but are confusedly mingled with bones of other quadrupeds of known genera, such as rhinoceroses, oxen, antelopes, horses, and frequently with remains of marine animals, particularly conchiferous species, some of which have even been found adhering to them. The positive testimony of Pallas, Fortis, and many others, does not allow us to doubt that this latter circumstance has frequently taken place, although it is not always observed. We ourselves have at this moment under our eyes a portion of a jaw covered with millepores and small oysters.

The strata which cover the bones of elephants are not of very great thickness, and they are scarcely ever of a rocky nature. They are seldom petrified, and there are only one or two cases recorded in which they were found imbedded in a shelly or other rock. Frequently they are simply accompanied with our common fresh water shells. The resemblance, in this latter respect, as well as with regard to the nature of the soil, between the three places, of which we have the most detailed accounts, viz. _Tonna_, _Cantstadt_, and the _Forest of Bondi_, is very remarkable. Every thing, therefore, seems to announce that the cause which has buried them, is one of the most recent of those that have contributed to change the surface of the globe. It is nevertheless a physical and general cause; the bones of _fossil elephants_ are so numerous, and have been found in places so desert and even uninhabitable, that we cannot suppose that they had been conducted there by man. The strata which contain them and those which are above them, shew, that this cause was aqueous, or that it was water that covered them; and in many places these waters were nearly the same as those of our present sea, since they supported animals nearly the same. But, it was not by these waters that they were transported to the places where they now are. Bones of this description have been found in almost every country that has been examined by naturalists. An irruption of the sea that might have brought them from places which the _Indian elephant_ now inhabits, could not have scattered them so far, nor dispersed them so equably. Besides, the inundation which buried them has not risen above the great chains of mountains, since the strata which it has deposited, and which cover the bones, are only found in plains of little elevation. It is not, therefore, seen how the carcases of elephants could have been transported into the north, across the mountains of _Thibet_, and the _Altaic_ and _Uralian_ chains.

Further, these bones are not rolled; they retain their ridges and apophyses; they have not been worn by friction. Very frequently the epiphyses of those which had not yet attained their full growth, are still attached to them, although the slightest effort would suffice to detach them. The only alterations that are remarked, arise from the decomposition which they have undergone during their abode in the earth. Nor can it with more reason be represented that the entire carcases had been violently transported. In this case, the bones would indeed have remained entire; but they would also have remained together, and would not have been scattered. The shells, millepores, and other marine productions which are attached to some of these bones, prove besides that they had remained at least some time stripped and separated at the bottom of the fluid which covered them. The elephants’ bones had therefore already been in the places in which they are found, when the fluid covered them. They were scattered about in the same manner as in our own country the bones of horses and other animals that inhabit it may be, and as the dead bodies are spread in the fields.

Every circumstance, therefore, renders it extremely probable, that the elephants which have furnished the fossil bones, dwelt and lived in the countries where their bones are at present found. They could only, therefore, have disappeared by a revolution, which had destroyed all the individuals then living, or by a change of climate, which prevented them from propagating. But whatever this cause may have been, it must have been sudden. The bones and ivory which are found in so perfect a state of preservation in the plains of Siberia, are only so preserved by the cold which congeals them there, or which, in general, arrests the action of the elements upon them. If this cold had come on by degrees and slowly, these bones, and still more the soft parts with which they are still sometimes invested, would have had time to decompose, like those which occur in warm and temperate countries. It would especially have been impossible that an entire carcase, like that discovered by Mr Adams, could have retained its flesh and skin without corruption, if it had not been immediately enveloped by the ice which preserved it. Thus, all the hypotheses of a gradual cooling of the earth, or of a slow variation, whether in the inclination or in the position of the axis of the globe, fall to be rejected.

If the present _elephants_ of _India_ were the descendants of these ancient elephants, which have been preserved in that climate to the present day, from their being there placed beyond the reach of the catastrophe which destroyed them in the others, it would be impossible to explain why their species has been destroyed in America, where remains are still found, which prove that they had formerly existed there. The vast empire of Mexico presented to them heights enough to escape from an inundation so little elevated as that which we must suppose to have taken place, and the climate there is warmer than is requisite for their temperament.

The various _mastodons_, the _hippopotamus_ and the _fossil rhinoceros_ lived in the same countries, and in the same districts, as the _elephants_, since their bones are found in the same strata and in the same state. Yet these animals very assuredly no longer exist. Every thing therefore, Cuvier maintains, concurs to induce a belief that the _fossil elephant_ is, like them, an extinct species, although it resembles more than they one of the species at present existing, and that its extinction has been produced by a sudden cause, by the same great catastrophe which destroyed the species of the same epoch.

3. _On the Great Mastodon, or Animal of the Ohio._

It appears that the _Great Mastodon_ or _Animal of the Ohio_, was very like the elephant in its tusks and whole skeleton, the grinders excepted; that it very probably had a proboscis; that its height did not exceed that of the elephant, but that it was a little more elongated, and had limbs somewhat thicker, with a more slender belly. Notwithstanding all these points of resemblance, the peculiar structure of its grinders is sufficient to constitute it of a different genus from the elephant. It further appears, that it fed much in the same manner as the hippopotamus and boar, choosing by preference the roots and other fleshy parts of vegetables; that this sort of food must have drawn it towards the soft and marshy places; that, nevertheless, it was not formed for swimming, and living often in the water like the hippopotamus, but that it was a true land animal. Its bones are much more common in North America than any where else. They are even perhaps exclusively confined to that country. They are better preserved, and fresher, than any other fossil bones known; and, nevertheless, there is not the slightest proof, the smallest authentic testimony, calculated to impress a belief that either in America, or any where else, there is still any living individual, for the various accounts which we have from time to time read in the journals respecting living mastodons, which had been observed in the forests or plains of that vast continent, have never been confirmed, and can only pass for fables.

NOTE

ON THE CAVES IN WHICH BONES OF CARNIVOROUS ANIMALS OCCUR IN GREAT QUANTITIES.

The extraordinary accumulations of fossil bones in caves and caverns in different districts, especially in those composed of limestone, have for many years engaged the attention of inquirers; and, of late, have afforded many interesting facts to the geologist and zoologist. In England, as will appear from the following details, many different fossil animals have been discovered in limestone caves; but hitherto the caves in Scotland, which will probably be found to contain interesting documents of an ancient population, have not been examined. As the subject is a curious and interesting one, we shall, in the following pages, principally from Cuvier’s great work, lay before our readers a pretty full account of the different caves, especially those that afford bones of carnivorous animals.

* * * * *

Numerous caves, brilliantly decorated with stalactites of every form, succeeding each other to a great depth in the interior of mountains, communicating together by openings so narrow as scarcely to allow a man to enter them crawling, and which are yet found strewed with an enormous quantity of bones of large and small animals, are without dispute among the most remarkable phenomena which the history of fossil remains could present to the contemplation of the geologist, especially when we reflect that this phenomenon recurs in a great number of places, and over a very extended space of country. These caves have been the object of research of several naturalists, some of whom have well described and figured the bones which they contain; and even before they were explored by the naturalist, they were celebrated among the common people, who, according to their custom, added many imaginary prodigies to the natural wonders which are really observed in them. The bones which they contain were long, under the name of _fossil unicorn_, an important article of commerce and materia medica, on account of the powerful virtues which were attributed to them; and it is probable that the desire of finding these bones contributed much to the more accurate knowledge of these caves, and even to the discovery of several of them.

The most anciently celebrated is the cave of _Bauman_, situated in the country of _Blankenburg_, which belongs to the Duke of Brunswick, to the south of the city of that name, to the east of _Elbingerode_, and to the north of the village of _Rubeland_, the nearest inhabited place, in a hill which forms one of the last declivities of the _Hartz_ toward the east. It has been described by many authors, among whom we shall particularly mention the great _Leibnitz_, in his _Protogæa_, pl. i. p. 97, where he gives a map of it, borrowed from the _Acta Eruditorum_ 1702, p. 305.

Its general direction is east and west, but the entrance faces the north. It is very narrow, although it is under a pretty large natural vault. The first cave is the largest. From this to the second, one must descend by another narrow passage, at first by creeping, and afterwards by a ladder. The difference of level is 30 feet. The second cave is the richest in stalactite of all forms. The passage to the third cave is at first the most difficult of all, and we have to climb with hands and feet; but it afterwards enlarges, and the stalactites of its walls are those in which the imagination of the curious has pretended to see the best characterized figures. It has two lateral dilatations, of which the map of the _Acta Eruditorum_ makes the third and fourth caves. At its extremity, we have still to ascend, in order to arrive at the real third cave, which forms a sort of portal. _Behrens_ says, in his _Hercynia curiosa_, that it cannot be reached, because it would be necessary to descend more than 60 feet; but the above mentioned map, and the description of _Von der Hardt_, which accompanies it, describe this third cave under the name of the Fifth, and place beyond it a narrow passage, terminated by two small grottoes. Lastly, _Silberschlag_, in his _Geogony_, adds, that one of these grottoes leads to a narrow passage, which, descending much, leads under the other caves, and terminates in a place filled with water. There are still many bones in these remote and little frequented parts. Most of those bones which are in collections from this cave, or which have been described, are of the bear genus.

A second cave, nearly as celebrated as the former, and very near, is that which is named, after the _unicorn, Enihornshæle_, at the foot of the chateau of _Scharzfels_, in a part of the Electorate of Hanover which is named the Dutchy of _Grubenhagen_, and nearly upon the last southern declivity of the _Hartz_. It has also been described by _Leibnitz_, as well as by _M. Deluc_, in his Letters to the Queen of England. The entrance is 10 feet high, and 7 broad. We descend vertically 15 feet into a sort of vestibule, the roof of which lowers to such a degree, that, at the end of 60 feet, we are obliged to creep. After a long passage, we come to two other caves, according to Leibnitz; but Behrens adds three or four, and says, that, according to the country people, we might penetrate nearly two leagues.

_Bruckmann_, who gives a map of this cavern (_Epistol. Itin._ p. 34.), represents only five caves, arranged nearly in a straight line, and connected by extremely narrow passages. The second is the richest in bones; the third, which is the most irregular, has two small lateral caves; the fifth is the smallest, and contains a fountain. Of the bones which have been taken from it, some are in the possession of M. Blumenbach and other naturalists; and others have been figured by _Leibnitz_ and _Mylius_. They belong to the bear, hyena, and tiger or lion genera.

The chain of the Hartz also presents some other caves of less celebrity, although of the same nature mentioned by Behrens in his Hercynia curiosa, namely,

The cave of _Hartzburg_, under the castle of the same name, above _Goslar_ to the south. We do not know why Büsching disputes its existence. It is true that Behrens cites J. D. Horstius erroneously, for having seen bones of various animals taken from it; for Horstius speaks only (_Obs. Anat. dec._ p. 10.) of the cave of _Scharzfels_.

The cave of _Ufftrungen_, in the county of _Stollberg_, to the south of the castle of that name. It is named in the country _Heim-knohle_, or _Hiding-hole_. Behrens thinks that fossil bones might be found in it.

Another cave of the same neighbourhood, is named _Diebsloch, Thieves’ Hole_. Skulls have been found in it, which were supposed to be human.

We shall not speak here of those caves of the Hartz in which bones have not been discovered. And even those in which they have been found, are, at the present day, almost exhausted, it being only by breaking the stalactite that any can be obtained, so much of them had been taken away for selling as medicines.

The caves of _Hungary_ come after those of the Hartz, with reference to the remoteness of the time at which they have been known. The first notice of them is due to _Paterson Hayn_, (Ephem. Nat. Cur. 1672, Obs. cxxxix. and cxciv.) _Bruckmann_, a physician of _Wolfenbüttel_, afterwards described them at length. (_Epistola Itineraria_, 77, and _Breslauer Sammlung_, 1725, First Trim. p. 628.) They are situated in the county of _Liptow_, on the southern declivities of the _Carpathian mountains_. They are known in the country by the name of _Dragons’ Caves_, because the people of the neighbourhood attribute to those animals the bones which occur in them, and with which they have been acquainted from time immemorial; but all those which have been figured by authors belong to the Bear family, and to the species which is named the _Great Cave Bear_ (_Grand Ours des cavernes_).

The caves of Germany the richest in bones are those of _Franconia_, of which _J. F. Esper_, a clergyman of the country of _Bayreuth_, has given a very detailed description in a work, printed in French and German, entitled, _Description des Zoolithes nouvellement decouvertes_, &c. _Nuremberg Knorr._ 1774, folio, with 14 coloured plates, and in a memoir inserted among those of the _Berlin Society of Naturalists_, vol. ix. 1784, p. 56. Another description was afterwards given, under the title of _Objets dignes de remarque des environs de Muggendorf_, by J. C. Rosenmüller, folio, with coloured views, Berlin, 1804. And more lately, M. Goldfuss, at present Professor of Natural History at Bonn, and Secretary of the _Academia Naturæ Curiosorum_, has made them the subject of a particular work printed in 1810 in German, under the title of _Environs of Muggendorf_, in which he describes them with the greatest care, as well as the surrounding country, of which he gives a very correct topographical chart. A great part of these caves is situated in a small bailiwick, named _Streitberg_, which was formerly a dependence upon the country of _Bayreuth_, but was inclosed in that of _Bamberg_, and now forms part of the kingdom of Bavaria. The greatest number occur in a small peninsula, formed by the river of _Wiesent_, which falls into the Pegnetz, and belongs to the basin of the _Main_.

However, the chief of all these astonishing caves, those of _Gaylenreuth_, are beyond the limits of this peninsula, being on the left bank of the Wiesent, to the north-west of the village from which it derives its name. The entrance is perforated in a vertical rock; it is 7½ feet high, and faces the east. The first cave turns to the right, and is upwards of 80 feet long. The unequal heights of the vault divide it into four parts; the first three are from 15 to 20 feet high, the fourth is only 4 or 5. At the bottom of this latter, on the level of the floor, there is a hole 2 feet high, which affords a passage to the second cave: it has first a direction to the south, over a length of 60 feet by 40 in breadth, and 18 in height; it then turns to the west for 70 feet, becoming lower and lower until at length the height is only 5 feet. The passage which leads to the third cave is very inconvenient, and one has to turn through various corridors: it is 30 feet across, and from 5 to 6 in height. The ground in it is kneaded with teeth and jaws. Near the entrance is a pit of from 15 to 20 feet, to which one descends by a ladder. After having descended, we come to a vault of 15 feet diameter by 30 in height; and towards the side at which the descent is made there is a cave strewed with bones. On still descending a little, a new arcade is met with, which leads to a cave 40 feet long, and a new pit of from 18 to 20 feet deep. After descending this, we reach a cavern about 40 feet high, all strewed with bones. A passage, of 5 feet by 7, leads to a grotto of 25 feet in length by 12 in breadth. Canals, 20 feet in length, conduct to another grotto of 20 feet in height. Lastly, there is another cave, 83 feet broad and 24 high, in which more bones are found than in any of the others.

The sixth cave, which is the last, has a northerly direction, so that the whole series of caves and passages nearly describes a semicircle.

A fissure in the third cave led to the discovery, in 1784, of a new cave, 15 feet long and 4 broad, in which the greatest quantities of hyena and lions’ bones were found. The aperture was much too small for these animals to have passed through it. A particular canal which ended in this small cave has afforded an incredible number of bones and large skulls entire.

In the Philosophical Transactions of 1822, pl. xxvi. there may be seen a profile of this cave, taken on the spot in 1816, by Professor Buckland, in which is to be especially remarked an enormous mass, entirely composed of bones enveloped in the stalactite, and thus forming an osseous breccia, but of quite a different nature from those which occur at Gibraltar and other places[432].

The cave of _Gaylenreuth_ is one of those the bones of which are most completely known, by the researches which have been made or caused to be made in it for a long time back by distinguished naturalists, such as MM. Esper, de Humboldt, Ebel of Bremen, Rosenmüller, Sœmmering, Goldfuss, &c., and by the numerous and rich collections which these researches have produced. According to the examination which Cuvier has made of the principal of these collections, three-fourths of the bones found there belong to the Bear genus, and to two or three species of that genus. The others belong to the hyena, tiger, wolf, fox, glutton, and polecat, or some nearly allied species. There are also found, although in much smaller number, bones of herbivorous quadrupeds, and, in particular, deer, of which fragments are in the possession of M. Ebel. It would even appear from a passage of M. Sœmmering’s, that a parcel of bones had been got in it belonging to an elephant’s skull[433]. According to Rosenmüller, there were found in it bones of men, horses, oxen, sheep, deer, roes, mules, badgers, dogs, and foxes, but which from the researches made by him in the cave itself, and from their state of preservation, must have been deposited at periods much later than those of the bear, tigers and hyenas[434].

The small peninsula situate nearly opposite to this cave, presents several other caves, as the _Schœnstein_, or _Beautiful Rock_, which contains seven contiguous caverns. The _Brunnenstein_, or _Fountain Rock_, in which, according to Esper, there are only found bones of known species, such as badgers, dogs, foxes, hogs, and deer; but Esper had too little anatomical knowledge for his testimony to be entirely relied on with respect to this. These bones are sometimes encrusted with stalactite. It contains also the _Holeberg_, or _Hollow Mountain_, in which eight or ten caves form a series of 200 feet in length, with two entrances. Bones of the same bears as at _Gaylenreuth_, are found here in various lateral depressions; and there are also deer and hogs.--The _Wizerloch_, so named from an ancient Sclavonic deity formerly worshipped there, the most dismal cavern of the whole country, situate in its most elevated part, and in which some vertebræ have been found. It is more than 200 feet long. The _Wunderhœhle_, which takes its name from its discoverer, has been known since 1773: its extent is 160 feet.--Lastly, the Cave of _Klaustein_, consisting of four grottoes, and upwards of 200 feet deep. Bones have been found in the third grotto, and most abundantly towards its extremity. It might be supposed that the name _Klaustein_ signified _Claw-rock_, and it would thus accord very well with a place where, without doubt, as at Gaylenreuth, a multitude of ungual phalanges of bears and animals of the tiger kind have been found. But M. Goldfuss asserts, that it was called _Klaustein_, or _St Nicholas’s Rock_, after a chapel of this name, which formerly stood upon it.--There are still the _Geiss-knok_, or _Goat Cave_, and a cave discovered in 1793. M. Rosenmüller found in them two human skeletons already covered with stalactite.

The country which surrounds this small peninsula has itself several caves, independently of that of _Gaylenreuth_, as those of _Mockas_, _Rabenstein_, and _Kirch-ahorn_, three villages, situate, the first to the south, and the other two to the north-east of Gaylenreuth. Bones were formerly found in the first. The last bears in the country the expressive name of _Zahn-loch_, or _Tooth Cave_; it also bears the name of _Hohen-mirschfeld_, a village on whose ground it is situate; and the country people have long been in the habit of seeking in it those bones, which they imagined to be medicinal. MM. Rosenmüller and Goldfuss have in fact found bear and tiger bones. There are two others in the territory of the same village, of which the one named _Schneider-loch_ (_Tailor’s Hole_), is said to have furnished the vertebræ of an elephant. That of _Zewig_, close upon _Waschenfeld_, at the very edge of the _Wiesent_, is nearly 80 feet deep; and it is said that skeletons of men and wolves were found in it.

All these hills, containing caves in their interior, and situate so near each other, seem to form a small chain, interrupted only by brooks, and which joins the more elevated chain of the _Fichtelberg_, in which are the highest mountains of Franconia, and from which flow the _Main_, the _Saale_, the _Eger_, the _Naab_, and many small rivers. M. Rosenmüller, and after him, others assert, that those which are in the hills to the north of the _Wiesent_, contain not a single fragment of bone, while those to the south are filled with them.

In 1799, a cave, remarkable for its situation, was discovered, which connects in some measure those of the _Hartz_ with those of _Franconia_. It is the Cave of _Glücksbrun_, in the bailiwick of _Altenstein_, in the territory of _Meinungen_, on the south-western declivity of the chain of the _Thuringerwald_ (Blumenb. _Archæol. Telluris_, p. 15. _Zach. Monate. Corresp. 1800, January_, p. 30.) It is the same which M. Rosenmüller names _Libenstein_, on account of its being on the road from _Altenstein_ to this latter, which is a bathing place. There is a description of it by M. Kocher, in the _Magazin für Mineralogie_, by M. C. E. A. De Hof, 1st band. heft. iv. p. 427. The limestone in which it is situate rests upon bituminous schist, and, rising much upwards, comes to rest upon primitive rocks. The limestone varies in hardness and in the nature of its fracture, and contains marine petrifactions, such as pectinites, echinites, &c.

In making a road, there was discovered an opening, from which a very cold air issued, which determined the Duke of Saxe-Meinungen to have it farther examined. A narrow passage, of twenty feet in length, was found, which led to a cave of thirty-five feet, having a breadth of from three to twelve, and a height of from six to twelve, according to the places, and terminated by a large piece of rock, which was removed. The labour of two years discovered and cleared a series of caves connected together, and of which the bottom rose and fell alternately. They terminate in a place where water flows; but various lateral fissures make it probable that there are still several caves which have not been opened, and that they perhaps form a sort of labyrinth.

The bottom and walls of this cave are furnished with the same mud as the others, but blacker. The bones were pretty numerous, and tinged with the same colour, but only two tolerably entire skulls were obtained. That of which M. Kocher gives a figure, is the species of bear named _Ursus spelæus_. There are also caves of this kind in Westphalia. J. Es Silberschlag, in the _Mem. des Naturalistes_ of Berlin (_Schriften_, vol. vi. p. 132), describes the one called _Kluter-hœhle_, near the village of _Oldenforde_, in the county of _Mark_, on the edge of the _Milspe_ and _Ennepe_, two streams which fall into the Ruhr, and with it into the Rhine. Its entrance is about half-way up a hill called _Kluterberg_, is only three feet three inches high, and faces the south. The cave itself forms a true labyrinth in the interior of the mountain.

Not far from this, in the same county, at Sundwich, two leagues from _Iserlohn_, is another cave, which, for about twenty-five years back, has furnished a very large quantity of bones, part of which has been carried to Berlin, and the rest has remained in the country in the hands of various individuals[435].

If we cast a glance upon a general map, it is not difficult to perceive a certain continuity in the mountains in which these singular caves occur. The Carpathians join with the mountains of Moravia and those of Bohemia called _Bœhmerwald_, to separate the basin of the Danube, from those of the Vistula, Oder and Elbe. The Fichtelgebirge separates the basin of the Elbe from that of the Rhine. The Thuringerwald and the Hartz continue to limit the basin of the Elbe, by separating it from that of the Weser.

These different chains have but slight intervals between them. The caves of Westphalia alone are not connected in so evident a manner with the others.

Very lately, bones have been discovered in a cavern, which extends more towards the south, and is even situate on the other or Italian side of the Alps. It is that of _Adelsberg_ in _Carniola_, a place situate on the great road from _Laybach_ to _Trieste_, and about half way between these two cities. The whole of this country is full of caverns and grottoes, which have given rise to numerous sinkings of the surface, thus giving a very singular appearance to the country. Several of these caverns have long been celebrated among naturalists. That of _Adelsberg_ is generally visited by travellers, on account of its being near the highway, and because a river called the _Piuka_ or _Poike_ is lost there, forming a subterranean lake, and emerging again on the north side, under the name of _Unz_. A hole which the Chevalier de _Lowengreif_ discovered in 1816, in one of its walls, at the height of 14 fathoms, conducted him to a series of new caves of vast extent, and of incomparable beauty, from the lustre and variety of their stalactites.

A part of these caves was, however, known, and must be, or have been accessible, by some other place, for inscriptions were found in them with dates, from 1393 to 1676, together with human bones, and entire carcases, that had been buried there. A German pamphlet was published at Trieste, in which are described all the windings of these subterranean passages, their different halls, their domes, their columns, and all the other appearances produced by their stalactites. We shall not follow the author (M. de _Volpi_, Director of the School of Commerce and Navigation at Trieste) through this immense labyrinth. Let it suffice to say, that this zealous naturalist asserts his having proceeded more than three leagues, almost in a straight line, and that he was only stopped by a lake which rendered it impossible to go on. It was about two leagues from the entrance that he discovered bones of animals, of which he gives figures, and which he describes under the name of Palæotheria. He had the politeness to communicate to me, says Cuvier, his drawings the year before, but it appears my reply did not reach him, for he makes no mention of it in his book.

Be this as it may, his figures clearly shewed that the bones in question belonged to the great cave-bear. In fact, several of these bones having been presented to the Congress of Laybach, _Prince Metternich_, whose enlightened taste for the advancement of knowledge has already been of so much service, had the goodness to address them to Cuvier, who disposed them in the Royal Cabinet, where any one may satisfy himself as to their species.

There are, without doubt, caves in many other chains, and several are known in France. Caves occur in Suabia, but no bones have been found in them; and, in general, it appears, that, before the last discoveries, and especially that which has been made in Yorkshire, none were known but those of Germany and Hungary that were rich in bones of carnivora. In truth, the rock of _Fouvent_, and which contains in one of its cavities bones of hyenas, and at the same time those of elephants, rhinoceroses and horses, might be considered as belonging to this order of phenomena; but as it was not explored to any depth, it cannot be certain that it is so.

The case is different with the _Kirkdale_ Cavern. It having been visited immediately after its discovery by several well informed persons, and especially by Mr Buckland, every thing has been made known with respect to it. It is situated in the East Riding of the county of York, twenty-five miles NNE. of the city of _York_, and at about the same distance to the west from the sea and the town of Scarborough. The small river of _Hodgebeck_ is lost under ground in the neighbourhood, much in the same way as the _Piuka_, near _Adelsberg_. It is placed in one of the limestone hills which form the northern boundary of the vale of _Pickering_, the waters of which fall into the Derwent. Mr Buckland compares the stone to that of the last strata of the Alpine limestone, such as are seen near Aigle and Meillene.

It was in the course of the year 1821, that some labourers working at a quarry, discovered by chance the opening, which was closed by rubbish, covered over with earth and turf. It is about 100 feet above the neighbouring brook. It can be entered to the distance of 150 or 200 feet, but we can only walk erect in some places, on account of the stalactites. On its sides there are seen spines of sea-urchins and other marine remains, incrusted in the mass of the rock; but it is on the bottom, and there only, that there is found the stratum of mud, of about a foot thick, stuck full of bones, as at Gaylenreuth. This mud, and the bones which it contains, are, in various places, covered or penetrated with stalactite, especially near places where the rock has lateral fissures.

The discovery having acquired much celebrity, a great number of people procured bones from it, and placed them in various public depots. Specimens have been deposited in the York Institution, that of Whitby and Bristol, the British Museum, the Museum of Oxford and Cambridge, and by Mr Young of Whitby, in the College Museum of Edinburgh; but the finest collection of the bones of Kirkdale was presented to Cuvier, and by him deposited in the Royal Cabinet in Paris. The greatest number of these bones without comparison, belong to hyenas of the same species as those of the caverns of Germany; but there are also many of other large and small animals, which Mr Buckland supposes to form twenty-one species. From the pieces which I have under my eye, says Cuvier, there indisputably occur bones of the _elephant_, _hippopotamus_, _horse_, an _ox_ of the size of the common _deer_, _rabbits_, _field-rats_; also bones of some other carnivora, namely, of the _tiger_, _wolf_, _fox_, and _weasel_. All these bones and teeth are accumulated on the ground, broken and gnawed, and there are even seen marks of the teeth which have fractured them. There are even intermixed with them excrements which have been recognized as perfectly similar to those of the hyena[436].

The hills in which these caverns occur resemble each other in their composition: they are all of limestone, and all produce abundance of stalactites. These stalactites line the walls, narrow the passages, and assume a thousand various forms. The bones are nearly in the same state in all these caverns: detached, scattered, partly broken, but never rolled, and consequently not brought from a distance by water; a little lighter and less solid than recent bones, but still in their true animal nature, very little decomposed, containing much gelatine, and not at all petrified. A hardened, but still easily frangible or pulverisable earth, also containing animal parts, and sometimes blackish, forms their natural envelope. It is often impregnated and covered with a crust of stalactite. A covering of the same nature invests the bones in various places, penetrates their natural cavities, and sometimes attaches them to the walls of the cavern. This stalactite is often coloured reddish by the animal earth which is mixed with it. At other times its surface is stained black; but it is easy to see that these appearances are caused by modern occurrences, and have no immediate connection with the cause which brought the bones into these cavities. We even daily see the stalactite increasing and enveloping here and there groups of bones which it had formerly respected.

This mass of earth, penetrated by animal matter, indiscriminately envelopes the bones of all the species; and, if we except some found at the surface of the ground, and which had been transported there at much later periods, which may also be distinguished by their being much less decomposed, they must all have been interred in the same manner, and by the same causes. In this mass of earth there are found, confusedly mingled with the bones (at least in the cave of Gaylenreuth), pieces of a bluish marble, of which all the corners are rounded and blunted, and which appear to have been rolled. They singularly resemble those which form part of the osseous brecciæ of _Gibraltar_ and _Dalmatia_.

Lastly, what further conspires to render this phenomenon very striking, is, that the most remarkable of these bones are the same in these caverns, over an extent of more than two hundred leagues. Three-fourths and upwards belong to species of _bears_, which are now extinct. A half, or two-thirds of the remaining fourth, belong to a species of _hyena_, which is equally unknown at the present day. A smaller number belong to a species of the _tiger_ or _lion_ kind, and to another of the _wolf_ or _dog_ genus; lastly, the most diminutive have belonged to various small carnivora, as the _fox_, the _polecat_, or at least species very nearly allied to them, &c.

The Kirkdale Cavern, however, forms a notable exception, inasmuch as none, or very few, bones of bears are found in it, and in its being the hyena that appears to predominate among the carnivora.

The species so common in the alluvial formations, the _elephants_, _rhinoceroses_, _horses_, _oxen_ or _aurochs_, and _tapirs_, are of very rare occurrence in the caves of Germany. There are even some in which no one is said to have found them, and the only bones of herbivora mentioned are remains of deer. In this point also, however, the Kirkdale cave differs much from the others, inasmuch as it abounds almost as much in bones of large and small herbivora, as in bones of carnivora. All the great pachydermata of the alluvial formations are seen in it: the elephants, rhinoceroses and hippopotami. There are also seen in it bones of oxen, deer, and even small bones of mice and birds. But there are no bones of marine animals of any species, either at Kirkdale or in Germany. Those who have pretended that they saw bones of _seals_, _morses_, or other similar species, have been led into error by the hypothesis which they had previously adopted.

These bones of carnivora, so numerous in the caves, are rare in the great alluvial strata; the hyena alone has been seen in any quantity at Canstadt, near Aichstedt, and in some other places. There have also been found some traces of bears in Tuscany and Austria, but their relative proportion is always infinitely less than in the caves; and it is always sufficiently proved by these circumstances, that these various animals have lived together in the same countries, and have belonged to the same epoch.

Cuvier concludes, there can only be imagined three general causes which might have placed these bones in such quantity in these vast subterranean cavities. Either they are the remains of animals which inhabited these abodes, and which died peaceably there; or inundations and other violent causes have carried them into these cavities; or, lastly, they had been enveloped in rocky strata, the dissolution of which produced these caverns, and they have not been dissolved by the agent which carried off the matter of the strata.

This last cause is refuted by the fact, that the strata in which the caves occur contain no bones; and the second by the entireness of the smallest prominences of the bones, which does not permit us to think that they had been rolled; for if some bones are worn, as Mr Buckland has remarked, they are only so on one side, which would only prove that some current has passed over them, and in the deposit in which they are. We are, therefore, obliged to have recourse to the first supposition, whatever difficulties it presents on its part, and to say that these caves served as a retreat to carnivorous animals, and that these carried there, for the purpose of devouring them, the animals which formed their prey, or the parts of these animals.

Mr Buckland has observed, that the hyena bones are not less broken and splintered than those of the herbivorous animals; from which he concludes, that the hyenas had devoured the dead bodies of their own species, as those of the present day still do.

These animals attack each other during their life; for the fossil head of a hyena is preserved, which had evidently been wounded and afterwards healed[437].

This supposition is moreover confirmed by the animal nature of the earth in which these bones are found[438].

This much is certain, that the establishment of these animals in the caves has taken place at a much later epoch than that at which the great rocky strata have been formed, not only those which compose the mountains in which the caves are situated, but the strata of much newer origin. No permanent inundation has penetrated into the subterranean dens, and formed a regular rocky deposit. The mud arising from the proper decomposition of these animals, and the stalactites that have been filtered through the wall of the caves, are the only matters which cover these remains, and these stalactites increase so rapidly, that M. Goldfuss already found a layer of them covering the names of MM. Esper and Rosenmüller, whose visits did not date thirty years before his own. The rolled stones that are met with, and the marks of detrition observed on some bones, announce, at the very utmost, but passing currents.

But how have so many ferocious animals which peopled our forests been extirpated? All the reply we can make is, that they must have been destroyed at the same time, and by the same cause, as the large herbivora, which, like them, also peopled these forests, and of which no traces remain at the present day any more than of them.

ACCOUNT OF THE CAVE CONTAINING BONES AT ADELSBERG IN CARNIOLA.

The following interesting account of the cave, slightly noticed at pages 524 and 525, is extracted from a memoir by M. Bertrand Geslin, Member of the Natural History Society of Paris, published in the number of the _Annales des Sciences Naturelles_ for April 1826.

M. Cuvier, says Gesler, speaking of the Adelsberg Cave, from the
account published by M. Volpi of Trieste, says, that it was nearly
two leagues from the entrance where he discovered bones of animals.

Having visited this cave myself, I am obliged to say that M.
Volpi’s assertion as to this matter is not very correct. On my way
to Trieste, in July 1823, before going to Adelsberg, I had the
advantage of seeing M. Volpi. In shewing me the bones collected
by him at Adelsberg, he also assured me that they were found two
leagues from the entrance of the cave, and only in a very compact
block of several cubic feet, from which it was not possible to
procure more, as he had taken all that he could easily remove.

Notwithstanding this discouraging account, I betook myself to
Adelsberg, in order to see a sample of those immense caverns of
secondary limestone. The entrance of the cave is situated in a
white compact secondary limestone, lying in great beds inclined
to the south-west, at an angle of from 30 to 35 degrees. At fifty
paces from the entrance, we find ourselves as in a large apartment,
which crosses the torrent of the Pinka. After passing to the left
bank of this torrent, we enter a rather low and not long passage,
which leads to a second apartment of an elongated form. It is here
that the line of chambers truly commences. They are of large but
variable dimensions, and are situated nearly upon a horizontal
plane.

On entering this second chamber, I saw that the ground was formed
of a yellow and reddish clayey mud, from one to two feet thick,
and more or less impregnated and covered with crusts of yellow
stalagmites. In the places where it offered little resistance, I
dug it up with the point of my hammer, and was fortunate enough to
disunite some fragments of bone, although, from what had been said
to me, I ought not to have expected to find them. From this I was
convinced, that if M. Volpi had only found bones at a distance of
two leagues from the entrance, it was because he had not been at
the trouble to search for them nearer. I fell to work with more
ardour, and succeeded in digging up some in good preservation,
such as radii, cubiti, femora, humeri, fragments of jaws, calcarea,
toes, vertebræ, &c., belonging to bears of different sizes, of the
species termed _Ursus spelæus_. It would appear that the hyena
tribe is rather rare here, for I only procured a single bone
belonging to it. It was particularly in two small lateral chambers,
near the narrow passage, that I obtained a great quantity of these
bones, the clay there having been dug up by the guides, in order to
make the floor of the great apartment even with it.

I continued to dig as I advanced, and everywhere found bones more
or less broken and enveloped in the clayey mud. After proceeding
for half an hour, I fell in with a mass, in an apartment of
considerable dimensions, which was of a conical form, and composed
of blocks of compact white limestone, of all sizes, mixed with
yellowish clayey mud. These blocks had their edges as sharp as if
they had only been lately broken. The mass, which reached to the
right wall of the cave, might be fifteen feet in height, and twenty
in diameter at its base: it was covered with stalactite in several
places. It was in this mass, at about ten feet above the floor of
the cave, in the clayey mud that filled up the interstices between
the blocks, that I found the entire skeleton of a young bear, in a
space of two square feet at most. The bones which I dug out were
the frontal part of the head, the lower jaw of the left side,
the seventh cervical and eighth dorsal vertebræ; the eighth and
fourteenth ribs of the right side; two tibia, femora, and cubiti,
and two large canine teeth of another bear. If I could have raised
up the limestone blocks, between which these bones lay, I might
without doubt have procured a great part of this skeleton. There
are still found here and there in the cave some small heaps of
clayey mud, with fragments of white secondary limestone, as well
as large isolated limestone blocks, which the guides are daily
destroying, to make the floor even for the convenience of visitors.

I had only advanced an hour and a quarter’s progress into the cave,
always finding bones, when the oil of my lamps beginning to fail, I
was obliged to return without reaching the block in which M. Volpi
had found the first bones. This block is without doubt owing to the
same causes as the heap of which I have spoken above.

The manner in which these heaps exist, being composed of blocks of
compact white secondary limestone, similar to that which forms the
walls of the cave, with sharp edges, and piled upon each other,
made me imagine that they might have fallen from the roof. As I
returned, I examined the ceiling of the vaults with attention. As
it was all covered over with stalactites, I could not discover any
fissure.

From this short excursion in the Adelsberg cave, I am induced
to believe, that the bones exist along the whole extent of the
cave, and that they occur in two different ways; _1st_, scattered
in the clayey mud which forms the floor of the chambers; and,
_2dly_, buried in heaps formed of blocks of white secondary compact
limestone, and yellow clayey mud.

The hypothesis which M. Cuvier admits as the most probable for
explaining the presence of these bones in the caves, is that which
would make these caves to have served as a retreat to carnivorous
animals.

The presence of bones in the clayey mud of the floor of the
Adelsberg cave accords well with this hypothesis; but the case
is different with those which I found in the heaps of limestone
blocks and clayey mud. The bones are not at the surface of the
heap, but rather towards its middle part, buried among the blocks,
and crushed by them. From this position, and the height at which
the skeleton mentioned above occurs from the floor of the cave,
it cannot be supposed that it formed part of the bones with which
the bottom of the cave is strewed, nor that the blocks had fallen
upon it. The bones contained in the heap in question must have been
brought into their present position at the same time, and by the
same cause as the limestone blocks. They could not, therefore, have
belonged to animals which inhabited these caves, and died there
peaceably.

If it be remarked, that these blocks, which are sometimes very
large, heaped up above one another, and mixed with clayey mud, have
their angles perfectly fresh, and are of the same nature as the
limestone of the walls of the cave, it cannot be admitted that they
have been brought from a distance. This mode of arrangement could
only have been produced by their falling from the roof of the cave.

The following facts also give support to this opinion. In the cave
of Gaylenreuth, a fissure of the third grotto, was the means, in
1784, of disclosing a new one, fifteen feet long and four broad,
where the greatest quantity of hyena or lion bones were found.
_The aperture was much too small for these animals to have passed
through it._

In a cave discovered in 1824, in the district of Lanark in Upper
Canada, Mr Bigsby observed, that the floor was covered with debris
of brown granular limestone, similar to that of the walls, and
that the bones especially formed a heap there. He thinks that the
animal, whose bones have been found in this cave, was much too
large to have got into it alive or entire.--_Silliman’s Journal,
June 1825_, p. 354.