The World Before the Deluge

by Louis Figuier

We ought to note, in order to make this explanation complete, that some geologists consider that these caves served as a refuge for sick and wounded animals. It is certain that we see, in our own days, some animals, when attacked by sickness, seek refuge in the fissures of rocks, or in the hollows of trunks of trees, where they die; to this natural impulse it may, probably, be ascribed that the skeletons of animals are so rarely found in forests or plains. We may conclude, then, that besides the more general mode in which these caverns were filled with bones, the two other causes which we have enumerated may have been in operation; that is to say, they were the habitual sojourn of carnivorous and destructive animals, and they became the retreat of sick animals on some particular occasions.

What was the origin of these caves? How have these immense excavations been produced? Nearly all these caves occur in limestone rocks, particularly in the Jurassic and Carboniferous formations, which present many vast subterranean caverns. At the same time some fine caves exist in the Silurian formation, such as the Grotto des Demoiselles ([Fig. 194]) near Ganges, of Hérault. It should be added, in order to complete the explanation of the cave formations, that the greater part of these vast internal excavations have been chiefly caused by subterranean watercourses, which have eroded and washed away a portion of the walls, and in this manner greatly enlarged their original dimensions.

But there are other modes than the above of accounting, in a more satisfactory manner, for the existence of these caves. According to Sir Charles Lyell, there was a time when (as now) limestone rocks were dissolved, and when the carbonate of lime was carried away gradually by springs from the interior of the earth; that another era occurred, when engulfed rivers or occasional floods swept organic and inorganic débris into the subterranean hollows previously formed; finally, there were changes, in which engulfed rivers were turned into new channels, and springs dried up, after which the cave-mud, breccia, gravel, and fossil bones were left in the position in which they are now discovered. “We know,” says that eminent geologist,[104] “that in every limestone district the rain-water is soft, or free from earthy ingredients, when it falls upon the soil, and when it enters the rocks below; whereas it is hard, or charged with carbonate of lime, when it issues again to the surface in springs. The rain derives some of its carbonic acid from the air, but more from the decay of vegetable matter in the soil through which it percolates; and by the excess of this acid, limestone is dissolved, and the water becomes charged with carbonate of lime. The mass of solid matter silently and unceasingly subtracted in this way from the rocks in every century is considerable, and must in the course of thousands of years be so vast, that the space it once occupied may well be expressed by a long suite of caverns.”

The most celebrated of these bone-caves are those of Gailenreuth, in Franconia; of Nabenstein, and of Brumberg, in the same country; the caves on the banks of the Meuse, near Liège, of which the late Dr. Schmerling examined forty; of Yorkshire, Devonshire, Somersetshire, and Derbyshire, in England; also several in Sicily, at Palermo, and Syracuse; in France at Hérault, in the Cévennes, and Franche Comté; and in the New World, in Kentucky and Virginia.

The ossiferous breccia differs from the bone-caves only in form. The most remarkable of them are seen at Cette, Antibes, and Nice, on the shores of Italy; and in the isles of Corsica, Malta, and Sardinia.

Fig. 194.—Grotto des Demoiselles, Hérault.

Nearly the same bones are found in the breccia which we find in the caves; the chief difference being that fossils of the Ruminants are there in greater abundance. The proportions of bones to the fragments of stone and cement vary considerably in different localities. In the breccia of Cagliari, where the remains of Ruminants are less abundant than at Gibraltar and Nice, the bones, which are those of the small Rodents, are, so to speak, more abundant than the mud in which they are embedded. We find, there, also, three or four species of Birds which belong to Thrushes and Larks. In the breccia at Nice the remains of some great Carnivora are found, among which are recognised two species of Lion and Panther. In the Grotto di San-Ciro, in the Monte Griffone, about six miles from Palermo, in Sicily, Dr. Falconer collected remains of two species of Hippopotamus and bones of Elephas antiquus, Bos, Stag, Pig, Bear, Dog, and a large Felis, some of which indicated a Pliocene age. Like many others, this cave contains a thick mass of bone-breccia on its floor, the bones of which have long been known, and were formerly supposed to be those of giants; while Prof. Ferrara suggested that the Elephants’ bones were due to the Carthaginian elephants imported into Sicily for purposes of sport.[105]

But the breccia is not confined to Europe. We meet with it in all parts of the globe; and recent discoveries in Australia indicate a formation corresponding exactly to the ossiferous breccia of the Mediterranean, in which an ochreous-reddish cement binds together fragments of rocks and bones, among which we find four species of Kangaroos.