even carcasses, are found. The single fact of the very wide diffusion of the mammoth bones, over enormous regions, in itself indicates that those creatures had long been inhabitants of such countries, living and dying there for ages; while their final destruction may have resulted from aqueous débacles dependent on oscillations of the land, the elevation of mountain-chains, and the formation of much local detritus.” The same causes will account for their destruction in this country—causes, whose effects are still traceable over the whole of continental Europe. Doubtless, these causes extended across the channel, and may have been cotemporaneous with the movements which resulted in separating us from France, occasioning débacles by the alternate upheaval and depression of the sea-bottom, which even the largest animals would be unable to contend against. In the midst of these movements, multitudes would resort to the higher protected grounds, in quest of food, or retire for shelter to caves and other concealments that were elevated above the waters. Remains, accordingly, of nearly all the quadrupeds of the period, the rhinoceros, hippopotamus, lion, tiger, hyena, bear, elk, are to be found in such places, associated with bones of the elephant family, and mixed, for the most part, with the alluvia and detrital gravel of the district. These animals appear not to have perished simultaneously or suddenly; but from the condition of the celebrated Kirkdale caves, when first discovered, it would rather seem that they had long haunted these places, the caverns being generally at a considerable elevation, with an entrance on the side of the valley. The floors were entirely covered with mud, teeth, bones, and stalagmitic incrustations, several feet deep—a den of monsters that were devouring each other, while the common enemy of destruction was approaching to seal the fate of all! The “Reliquiæ Diluvianæ” of Buckland, which first introduced the notice of these caves to the public, assumed the Mosaic deluge as the cause of the catastrophe: other hypotheses have been resorted to, as that certainly would not apply to all the circumstances of the case. Bones of a species of hare or rabbit, the water-rat, mouse, weasel, with fragments of the skeletons of ravens, pigeons, larks, and ducks, are also included among the relics of the fiercer tribes; and many have supposed that these were drifted in by subaqueous currents, or dropped through the fissures, which are both numerous and large in the limestone in which the caverns, for the most part, are situated.