Page images
PDF
EPUB

OBSERVATIONS ON CAVES AND FISSURES IN GENERAL.

CAVES and fissures are every where numerous in limestone rock, though but few of them comparatively are seen rising to the surface of the land that reposes upon them; nor from their bold and deep descent towards the vallies which lie beneath. Sometimes, however, they rise to the surface, and open their mouths, ready to devour incautious animals which approach too near to them, which is sometimes the case in consequence of the bushes which overhang their dangerous shafts. In Derbyshire, in the district of the Peak, the farmers have often to lament the loss of their cattle which adventure too near their descent; so it would be in the Counties of Monmouth and Glamorgan, were it not for the precautionary measures adopted by the inhabitants, to prevent injury by those dreadful chasms which intersect the country. Caves and fissures, whether in Britain, Germany, or any other country, are analogous in their formation, and alike in the deposits which are made in them. Most of those which have been explored, are such as were made important by sinking shafts in search for minerals, or were intersected by the removal of the rock, for the purpose of procuring stone for building and mending the roads, and thereby discovering those animal remains which had been inhumed in them, while the openings of many are seen from the surface, which have not yet been investigated. One

F

has been explored at Hutton, in Mendip-hills, three near Plymouth, and two in Crawley rocks, near Swansea; besides one at Gailenreuth, in Germany, and at other places on the continent. Some of these fissures rise vertically to the surface, others ascend in an oblique direction, having ledges or landing places, one above the other, which communicate with lateral fissures and cavernous chambers; and others are horizontal, leading to the face of the rock, and continuing in that direction. These are fit habitations for animals, and even human bones have been found in them. In a cavern at Paviland, 15 miles west of Swansea, was discovered the skeleton of a female; it is supposed from this circumstance, and from finding different utensils there, of a culinary and other descriptions, that this had once been a human abode. We read of the primitive christians living in dens and caves of the earth. The cavernous state of limestone rock is known by ab. sorbing the water from the surface, drawing it from the high grounds, and disgorging it in low situations, or in places where the rock becomes compact and void of fissures; there it finds vent and bubbles up, sometimes in amazing volumes. Many of the becks or rivulets of this district sink, and af ter having run a mile or two under ground, rise again nearly in the direction of the beck from which it had disappeared: this is the case in the Hodges beck, the Dove, and others.

Many of these caverns and fissures contain animal remains imbedded in marl, some are filled with marly clay unmixed with bones and teeth, and

others contain a mixture of bones, pebbles, marl, sand, and properties of different descriptions.

These are known facts which the geologist will not dispute. But the time of the introduction of these remains into these openings, is a subject on which the learned differ: Respecting detached bones and teeth discovered in the solid rock, or in crevices which have no communication with the land, or with the sides of the rocks in which they are found, I do not hesitate to say, that they must have been imbedded there, or lodged in those crevices, when that rock was in a soft state. The large fis sures filled entirely with loam, and containing no animal remains, were formed probably by the junction of the rock in those places being prevented, by the argillacious matter which had collected there, and had then no way of escape; but when the waters retired, many of the caverns and fissures so formed and filled with marl, bones, pebbles, and loam, would be left partly empty. Some time afterward, perhaps the rock in which they are now discovered subsided, and widened those caverns, leaving them with the matter found in them in the state in which accident presents them to public notice, other fissures communicating with the earth, have been the unexpected graves of animals traversing the land which surrounded them, and some animals perhaps have at distant periods been thrown into those caverns, for the convenience of removing them from public view.

Could we suppose

[ocr errors]

that this rock was formed before the deluge mentioned in the book of Genesis,

nothing could be more reasonable than the sentiment that those animals, the remains of which are found in vertical fissures and caverns beneath them, were washed in by the torrent of water, when it began to move upon the face of the earth: that the fluid found them near the spot, or even at some distance from it, and propelled them forwards to the vortex. But as it is from the account of Moses probable, that this rock is of recent formation, that could not have been the case: it is more probable that these animal remains, associated with marl and other matter, obstructed the formation of the rock in those places in which we now behold caverns and fissures, and have remained there since that time. The subsiding of the rock, as observed before, might have widened those chasms; and where the mouth of them was open, the water might have carried away the marl which had assisted in the formation of them, and left them partly empty; and where this was not the case, when the water began to retire from the earth, it would take away part of the argillacious matter with it, through the lower crevices of the rock, and leave the opening but partially filled with loam, or bones, loam and pebbles mixed, the horizontal caverns being cleared out by the running off of the water, carrying the loam with it would be left as fit habitations for carnivorous animals; such, I conceive, was the cave at Kirkdale: which was soon after, probably, inhabited by Hy.

ænas.

A Concise View of Ancient History to the Norman Conquest, intended as an Introduction to the History of Kirkby-Moorside, and its Vicinity.

GENERAL OBSERVATIONS.

BEFORE I enter on the history of Kirkby-Moorside, and its vicinity, I shall epitomise the history of the world to the invasion of Britain by the Romans, and from that period to the revolution effected by the conquest of William duke of Normandy; glancing at a few particulars, and presenting a few features of the narrative, so as to convey as correct and comprehensive a view as I can of the connection of one circumstance with another, to prepare the mind for the profitable reading of those accounts which may afterwards be detailed.

Before the time of the Romans little is known with certainty respecting the ancient Britons, but fables are substituted for facts, and conjectures for certainty, this, indeed, is the case not only with respect to Britain, but with the first ages of all the nations of the earth. The accounts we have of them are involved in much obscurity; and after we arrive at certainty respecting their transactions, what do we discover but an history of wrongs and of changes, elevations and depressions of empires; cruelty,

« PreviousContinue »