Читать книгу Cavern Researches - Rev. John MacEnery - Страница 4

Table of Contents

Researches of this nature do not date far back in this country. Except as places of popular resort, caverns attracted little notice before their fossil contents were brought to light. Had this event occurred at an earlier period, they would, doubtless, have been regarded with the same feelings that those were in which bones were first discovered in Germany. There they were generally reported to be the sepulchres of fabled animals, and styled after them the “Dragon’s Grottoes.”

As their relics were presumed to possess supernatural virtues, they were sought for as charms and cures; and in course of time rose into such estimation, as a sovereign specific, that they finally took their station in the materia medica, under the designation of the Liquor fossilis. Nothing more was wanting to make them an object of speculation, to supply the demands for which, the mountains were ransacked for caverns, and the caverns for bones, a circumstance to which may be traced the discovery of both one and the other over a large tract of the Continent.

From the people, as happens in most cases, the subject passed into the hands of men of science. It now became important to ascertain if these mysterious relics were the remains of the animal to which popular belief assigned them. It is not difficult to conceive how the multitude, ever prone to the marvellous, should have been led astray by their imagination, but that the learned should have persisted in attributing them to a chimæra, whose prototype, it was gravely contended, still existed in Transylvania, it is not so easy to comprehend. Others saw a resemblance to a hippopotamus, but it could only apply to its bulk.

In this posture stood the controversy when comparative anatomists interposed, with the immortal Cuvier at their head, and having first shewn from the immutable laws observed in nature, in the structure of her works, that no such monster could have proceeded from her hands, and that it was purely a creation of the fancy of painters and poets, they transferred the disputed remains to an extinct species of bear, essentially different from the modern in its form and size.

A similar misapprehension prevailed with respect to the nature of the fossil bones discovered in the plains. From their occurring in the earth, the people of the north of Asia concluded that they had belonged to an animal which lived, like the mole, underground, and perished as soon as it saw the light. Thence it was called Mammoth—Earth-born.

Even by the learned they were regarded, during the middle ages, as the remains of giants.—It was at no very distant period that they were assigned to the Elephant and Mastodon.—Their tusks were wrought up for the same purposes as recent ivory, and the enamel of their teeth, stained by the oxide of copper, passed as an article of commerce, for torquoise.

The species of the cavern animal being once determined, the transition was easy as to the cause of its inhumation in such regions. Already had the speculative genius of naturalists on the Continent been long exercised in search of a clue to the difficulty, when the discovery of similar phenomena in the cleft of a rock in Yorkshire, by some labourers employed in working a quarry, brought the subject under the consideration of British geologists.

A leading member of one of the Universities repaired to the spot, seized the facts as they revealed themselves, and speedily announced those results which profess to resolve the problem.

An appeal, however, having been made to a larger search for confirmation of these views, a fresh impulse was given to the labours of those engaged in this field of enquiry.

Both continents were accordingly explored for further evidence, and with such effect that almost each new arrival brought home parcels of fossil remains collected from rivers, lakes, and superficial gravel, throwing light, at least, upon the co-ordinate branch of the question, incorporated with the theory of caves, concerning the distribution of correlative animals through the soil over the surface of the globe.

Nor was illustration on the point immediately under consideration slow in following. The unexpected discovery of a living Hyena’s retreat, in India, the threshold and floor of which were strewed over with the half-devoured carcases of animals of the country, disclosed coincidences with the cavern of Kirkdale, such as the most sanguine could have scarcely dared to anticipate.

In the meantime excavations were carried on in superficial deposits and caves in France and the Netherlands, affording results bearing on the question which shall be discussed in the sequel. Nor were naturalists at home behind their brethren abroad in industry and skill. Each district was examined, either by men qualified by habit and science, or by persons, like myself, compelled solely by a general interest in the research. Thus was a spirit of enquiry widely propagated among all classes, in the short space of a few years, during which it may be asserted, that more light has been struck out on the condition of the earth, than in the same number of centuries preceding it. By the concurrent discoveries of comparative anatomists on the continent, and Geologists aided by chemists in this country, that rapid approach was made to a knowledge of the nature and revolutions, physical constitution and history, of the globe, which advanced the private pursuit of a few naturalists, to the rank of science, second only to the sublimest of all studies, in the grasp of its views and importance of its inductions.

The cavernous nature of the limestone on the coast of Devonshire did not fail to attract Geologists from a distance, whilst those living in its vicinity pressed forward to anticipate the researches of strangers, and to bear away from them the palm of original discovery.

Kent’s Cavern was too generally frequented from the earliest periods, as an object of natural curiosity, not to draw attention to it as most likely to afford organic remains. So far back as 1823-4, it had already been visited by the person most concerned in its disclosures, but the pressure of professional duties permitted him, it appears, little more than a cursory glance at its surface.

In the meantime the ground was broken by others impatient to lift the veil from its depths, some of whom sought the elucidation of an important question involved in its history, while others avowedly looked there only for a color to preconceived theories respecting its conformation and contents.

Mr. Northmore, who had already traversed the county in search of Druidical and Roman antiquities, is understood to have been the first that discovered the existence of its fossil reliques. We refer to his own statement, it being best to let him relate in his own words his impressions respecting it; the reader will be thus enabled to judge of the degree of weight that should attach to this gentleman’s speculations.

“In the month of September, 1824, I visited, with my family, Torquay, without having the remotest idea of making any excavations in its caverns for the purpose of discovering their hidden treasures, but with the full and avowed design of examining Kent’s Hole for a very different object, viz., to ascertain whether it were or were not a Mithratic cavern; for the Druidical priesthood, like their Egyptian, Chaldæan, and Brahminical brethren, worshipped in such cavernous recesses, whether natural or artificial, the Solar God, under a variety of names, such as Mindhar, or Mithras, Bel, Belinus, Beluenus, Belatucader, the Tyrian Hercules, Cocideus, &c., while the Eastern titles of that Deity were more generally those of Osiris, Orus, Thoth, Budha, Cueshua, Mahadera, or Seera, and more than a hundred others. In several of these deep and gloomy caverns or temples, which mystically represented the Diluvial abyss, and particularly in those of Elephanta or Ellora in Hindostan the emblems of the Deus Genitor yet remain. **

“Having mentioned my intention to my brother-in-law, Captain Welby, resident at Torquay, who had the beautiful work of Belzoni, on the Pyramids of Egypt, lying on his table, he kindly offered it for my perusal, thinking it might be of service to me in my Mithratic pursuits, as in truth it really was; for the fact is, that the Pyramids of Egypt, as was the tower of Babel, were built for the same object and mystery. The water of the sacred Nile was brought into them and used for the same purpose of Baptismal Regeneration as the natural ‘pellucid water’ of Castletown cave, and Kent’s Hole, and the rock basins and stone bowls of the nymphs and Druids; and the tanks and reservoirs of the Hindoo pagodas were designated to a similar end.

“It now occurred to me that I might, as the saying is, kill two birds with one stone, and extract as many organic remains from our Devonian caverns as the Professor had done at Kirkdale. With both these objects then in view, I hired two assistants (W. Rossiter and John Ferris) and accompanied by an able draughtsman, Mr. Gendall, of Exeter, I set out, on the 21st Sept., 1824, with the double object of discovering organic remains, and ascertaining the existence of a temple of Mithras; and happy am I to say that I was successful in both objects. In the former pursuit, indeed, I have been followed by hundreds, in the latter by none. The Baptismal lake of ‘pellucid water’ the ‘creeping path’ of stone, purification, and, if I am not quite mistaken, for I speak doubtfully, the ‘mystic gate of obstacle,’—the ‘oven mouth,’ and possibly one more arcane memorial sufficiently satisfied my mind upon the temple of the extensively worshipped, and thousand named Deity Belus;—but upon this subject no more at present,—I proceed to the organic remains of the sacred Arkæan cave.

“On entering the Cavern, and being at that time a novice in the art of exploring, I began to consider in what part it was most likely to find the expected treasures, and seeing a small recess, which I technically called a den, on the left side, some way in the cavern, of a size sufficiently capacious to hold a large tiger, I began to dig therein, through the stalagmitic covering, and in less than three minutes I could not forbear exclaiming with joy, ‘here it is,’ and I pulled out an old worn-down tusk of the Hyena, and soon afterwards a metatarsal bone of the cavern bear. About twenty or thirty other teeth and bones were the result of that day; but among them, and what I much prized, were the two jaws, upper and lower, of either the wolf or the fox; these I placed, as I thought, safely in my basket, but upon my return to my lodgings I found they were gone, and, though I subsequently offered a reward to the finder, I was never able to recover them. Such, then, were the fortunate results of the first day, and my object was complete, for in truth my views turned more to principles than mere matters of fact and experience.”

Mr. Northmore was speedily followed by a gentleman well known to the scientific world for his contributions to almost every department of knowledge. Though not the original discoverer, Mr. W. C. Trevilyan was certainly the first that obtained any results of value to science, which he lost no time, on his return to London, in making known; he had an excellent engraving executed by Miss Morland, the present Mrs. Buckland, exhibiting single teeth of Rhinoceros, Hyena, and Tiger, with jaws of the Bear and Fox, and one or two inconsiderable bones.

This, it appears, was the extent of what was known of the Cavern up to 1825; too little, manifestly, to satisfy the longing of the public for the fullest information. The existence of fossil bones referrible to five species was established, it is true; but in what number, and in what state, and under what conditions the great body of organic remains occurred, these were enigmas that this handful of fossils was insufficient to solve.

It is at this point that my labours commence, of which, though late, I propose to lay the narrative before the public. I had hoped, and it was to be desired, that the subject would have been taken up in the interval by those better able to handle it; and it was in this expectation that I had long laid aside all intention of sending my notes to the press. Other and greater undertakings have retarded the execution of the design where I know it was contemplated. There remains to me, therefore, no other alternative than to yield to the duty which my discoveries impose on me, towards science, by publishing an account of what I know of the Cavern, and avail myself of the return of health accorded to me by a merciful Providence to record those researches, from which illness, not improbably occasioned by them, had long compelled me to desist. It being my desire to present a faithful picture of this extraordinary repository of the relics of successive ages, I pray the reader to transport himself to the scene and follow me through its depths, that he may be witness and judge of the facts which shall be exposed to his view. For this purpose it will be necessary to enter into minute details, which in a work dealing in general conclusions built upon previously ascertained facts might have been dispensed with. Though at the close of our researches we should give expression to the irresistable inferences at which we arrived, our aim is rather to supply matter to others than to speculate ourselves. Thus much we thought it necessary to premise before entering upon our narrative.