In 1904 we had the pleasure of escorting that veteran speleologist, Monsieur E. A. Martel, through the old and the new caves at Wookey Hole. About the same time efforts were made anew to force a way into unexplored territory, with not uninteresting results. Many hours were spent one day by three of us in a hole that we had discovered just within the doorway of the cavern, a thing that had most unaccountably escaped observation hitherto, though right under our noses. The opening pointed in the direction of the lower cave mouth, where the Axe comes out; but it certainly did not look very promising. Crawling in, we found ourselves in a steeply descending passage, almost completely choked by stones and cave earth. But at the end of the first portion it was noticed that the floor dropped suddenly, indicating a chamber or gallery below. An afternoon was spent in the laborious task of shifting rocks, small stones, and earth, and passing up the fragments, great and small, from hand to hand, until they could be placed in safe positions near the mouth of the hole. Eventually, an ancient channel through the solid rock was disclosed, and at the end of 60 feet or so a broad low chamber appeared, floored with rocks and earth, and roofed in with solid rock at a height of 12 or 14 inches. Pushing on, the leader speedily found he was jammed between floor and ceiling, and could go no farther without more engineering; but an elder wand was procured, a candle tied to the end of it, and this rough-and-ready torch being pushed forward, it was possible to see some 35 feet ahead into the low chamber, in the depths of which a row of spiky stalactites stretched across like an alabaster grating.
To explore this chamber thoroughly, it will be necessary to hollow out a passage in the soft floor. In all likelihood, it crosses the present river-course at a level only a few feet higher. Quantities of pottery, bones, teeth, and fragments of charcoal were found in digging out the obstacles. It seems most probable that the hole was stopped up by human agency in prehistoric ages; perhaps it was a place of sepulture. The obstacles were carefully wedged together, and their removal caused much difficulty. It is not pleasant to lie on one's back in a hole, whose roof is only a few inches above one's face, and have a block of Limestone rolled from end to end of one's frame, without allowance for projections in either. In all several tons of material were shifted and carried out of the way. Much of the pottery had designs of a primitive character worked on the surface; the more elaborate was Romano-British. Considerable sections of amphoræ and other vessels have since been pieced together.