The celebrated cave of Kent’s Hole,[209] known from time immemorial, was first found to contain fossil bones by Mr. Northmore, and Sir W. C. Trevelyan in 1824, and was subsequently explored by the Rev. J. MacEnery in the five following years, during which he met with flint implements in association with the extinct animals in the undisturbed strata, and obtained the teeth of the sabre-toothed feline, named by Prof. Owen _Machairodus latidens_, which has never before or since been discovered in any other cavern in Britain. His manuscripts unfortunately were not used until they passed into the hands of Mr. Vivian, of Torquay, who published an abstract in 1859. Subsequently they were published in full by Mr. Pengelly, in 1869. The discovery of the flint implements, verified by Mr. Godwin Austen in 1840, and six years later also by a committee of the Torquay Natural History Society, was received with incredulity by the scientific world, until the result of the exploration of the Brixham cave had placed the fact of the co-existence of man with the extinct mammalia beyond all doubt. In 1864 a committee[210] was appointed by the British Association for the carrying on the investigation, which from that time to the present has been conducted under the careful supervision of Mr. Pengelly. The cave consists of two parallel series of chambers and galleries, an eastern and a western, which penetrate the low cliff of Devonian limestone in the direction of the joints, with a northern and southern entrance, very nearly at the same level, “about fifty feet apart, from 180 to 190 feet above the level of mean tide, and about seventy feet above the bottom of the valley immediately adjacent.” The largest chamber of the eastern series is sixty-two feet from east to west, and fifty-three from north to south. The extent of the cave has not yet been ascertained. The contents, examined with the minutest care (on Mr. Pengelly’s method, see Appendix I.), were found to be arranged in the following order. (A.) The surface was composed of dark earth varying in thickness from a few inches to a foot, on which rested large blocks of limestone, fallen from the roof. It contained mediæval remains, Roman pottery, and combs fashioned out of bone, similar to those discovered in the Victoria and Dowkerbottom caves in Yorkshire, which prove that the cave was frequented during the historic period. A barbed iron spear-head, a bronze spear-head, other bronze articles, and polished stone celts, establish the fact that it was also used during the iron, bronze, and neolithic ages. This stratum contained the broken bones of the short-horn (_Bos longifrons_), goat, and horse, large quantities of charcoal, and was to a great extent a refuse-heap like that in the Victoria cave. [Illustration: FIG. 96.--Lanceolate Implement from Kent’s Hole (1/1). (Evans.)[211]] [Illustration: FIG. 97.--Oval Implement from Kent’s Hole (1/1) (Evans.)]