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fragments of domestic pottery found about the habitations. Both 

 are made of clay mixed with broken stone ; sometimes nearly half 

 the paste consists of broken stone — such stone as is usually found 

 in the neighbourhood — and varying in size from grains of sand up 

 to that of a pea. This was done with an object — to prevent the 

 unbaked vessel from losing its form, and to prevent its cracking 

 while it was being baked ; for these vessels have all been baked, 

 not in a kiln, but before an open fire. If they had been merely 

 sun-dried or sun-baked, as many writers have said, they would 

 long ago have returned to their constituent elements. They are 

 always hand-made, the potter's wheel being then unknown. 



The difference between the sepulchral and the domestic vessels is 

 that the former are highly ornamented : the latter are plain and 

 strong ; they are also generally round-bottomed, which shows that 

 their owners did not use tables, and consequently did not use 

 chairs. They probably squatted on their hams, and placed their 

 vessels in hollows on the ground, and took their food from them 

 with their hands, or with a spoon of bark or of wood, or of shell. 



From the character of the paste of which these utensils are 

 made, it is obvious they could not be used for cooking. If their 

 proprietors were acquainted with the art of heating water, they did 

 it by a "pot-boiler," or large stone heated red hot in the fire, and 

 then dropped into the water. These stones are often found, and 

 are generally much cracked. They are used to this day in remote 

 parts in Scotland. 



Now there is another fact we can gather about our Celtic friend 

 who used this pottery. He must always have had his milk tainted, 

 and as use is second nature, he probably liked it "gamey," and 

 preferred it to fresh milk. Similar pottery is still made and used in 

 the Isle of Lewis, and called "craggans." In consequence of their 

 porousness, the " craggans" generally contain organic matter in a 

 state of putrescence. When fresh milk is poured into a craggan, 

 it almost immediately becomes tainted, and thus where craggans 

 are much used, there is a difficulty in getting fresh milk, whose 

 taste thus becomes unfamiliar, and people soun get to like best 



