We daily examined such caves and grottoes as came under our notice; and systematically excavated some half-dozen, which had apparently been used in former days as native habitations. Below the floor of one, Mr. Edmunds had already discovered a small chamber walled and roofed with slabs, which the natives said had been used as a place of hiding in cannibal days; but generally the earth deposit is very shallow, and the yields were the same only as those of the houses at Orongo, a few spear heads, bone needles, and sea-shells whose contents had been used for food. There were few objects among the natives which lent themselves to preservation for any length of time; they never made pottery, although there is clay in the island; wooden articles would generally rot, and they had no form of metal. This reflection reconciled us in some degree to what was otherwise a disappointment, our inability to reach the most thrilling of the caves, which are half-way up the great sea-cliffs; they can be seen from the ocean, and are known to have been used, but the original track has either been washed away by the encroaching waves or lies in a tumbled mass on the beach below. A special voyage was made round the island in _Mana_ with the object of studying these caves; some of the Expedition went in the yacht, and signalled their situation to a second party, who rode along the coast and placed marks on the cliff as a guide for subsequent exploration. We finally, however, gave up the idea of attempting to reach them; it would have been possible, no doubt, to have done so from the top, with a rope and experienced climbers, but a certain amount of danger would have been inevitably involved, and, considering the smallness of our numbers and the circumstances, we felt it unwise to take the risk of accident. We do not believe, in view of our experience elsewhere, that they are likely to contain anything of material value, but, in any case, they remain unrifled for our successors.