122 



single foss and rampart of the second rath.* Beyond the latter is 

 another much smaller, though from its paramount height, being the 

 the only one seen from the valley, it would appear to have been the 

 royal station ; several others are to be found down the opposite or 

 western declivity, so numerous that they are all said to cover nearly 

 twenty acres ; while a little to the north of this supposed royal fort, 

 is a very singular pit, cut bowl-like out of the hill, and near it two 

 long parallel ridges. The former is alleged to have been used for cooking 

 the meat, and the latter for the purpose of enclosing a common hall. 



Tradition says, that all the above-mentioned raths were crowned 

 with buildings, possibly similar to those of the ancient Welsh kings, -f- 

 and that the very fosses were arched in covered ways ; but there can 

 be no doubt that all such erections must have been of wood or wicker 

 work, covered perhaps with fern or heath, and that little credence can 

 be given to the poetry of "Tara's walls," from which some worthy 

 antiquarians have derived a deal of harmless satisfaction. This part 

 of the country, like most others of Ireland, was in those times forested 

 with timber, and prudence as well as convenience suggested the use 

 of that material. Of its being so used to a great extent, the Irish an- 

 nals, long tradition,, and exclusive probability, are the best evidences, 

 with which the natural and artificial appearances of Tara concur, and 

 hence it is, that the praises of the very ancient Irish kings, are propor- 

 tioned to the quantity of ground they cleared of woods. J Timber 

 felled for making houses, is repeatedly spoken of in Domesday Book, 

 while in Fenn's Lettei's,§ houses, framed and made ready on the spot 



* The whole diameter of this rath is traversed by a long, broad, raised grave, containing 

 the bodies of nearly 300 of the misguided wretches who fell in 1798, at what is called the battle 

 of Tara. 



t Vide Leges Wallise, pp. 167 and 263. X See Cambr. Eversus, p. -59. 



§ Vol. 3. p. 141. 



