, the last traces of the
Julia Augusta.

"I hope these rocks are porphyry," said Janet, gazing upward; "it is
such a lovely name."

"Yes, they are," said the unblushing Inness. "The Troglodytes, whose
homes are beneath, were fond of porphyry. They were very aesthetic, you
know."

We now reached the entrance of one of the caverns and looked in.

"The Troglodytes," continued Inness, "were the original, _really_
original, proprietors of Mentone. They lived here, clad in bear-skins,
and their voices are said to have been not sweet. See Pliny and Strabo.
The bones of their dinners left here, and a few of their own (untimely
deaths from fighting with each other for more), have now become the most
precious treasures of the scientific world, equalling in richness the
never-to-be-sufficiently-prized-and-investigated kitchen refuse of the
Swiss lakes."

But the Professor, overhearing something of this frivolity at the sacred
door, emerged from the hole in which he had been digging, and, covered
with dust, but rich in the possession of a ball and socket joint of some
primeval animal, came to the entrance, and forcibly, if not by force,
addressed us:

"At a recent period it has been discovered that these five caverns in
this limestone rock--"

"Alas, my porphyry!" murmured Janet.

"--contain bones of animals mixed with flint instruments imbedded in
sand. The animals were the food and the flint instruments the weapons of
a race of men who must have existed far back in prehistoric times. This
was a rich discovery; but a richer was to come. In 1872 a human
skeleton, all but perfect, a skeleton of a tall man, was discovered in
the fourth cavern, surrounded by bones which prove its great
antiquity--which prove, in fact, almost beyond a doubt, that it belonged
to--the--_Paleolithic epoch_!" And the Professor paused, really overcome
by the tremendous power of his own words.

[Illustration: OIL MILL]

But I am afraid we all gazed stupidly enough, first at him, then into
the cave, then at him again, with only the vaguest idea of
"Paleolithic's" importance. I must except Verney; he knew more. But
he had gone inside, and was now digging in the hole in his turn to find
flints for Janet.

Mrs. Trescott, who was our bone-master (she had studied anatomy, and
highly admired "form"), asked if the skeleton had been "painted in
oils."

Miss Elaine hoped that they buried it again "reverently," and "in
consecrated ground."

The Prof