23 
local rock is Devonian slate, and by its abundance the inhabitants 
were probably determined in their use of it for their simple needs.” 
He (the lecturer) found that the crouched-up position of 
burial was very prevalent in that period, and Joly, in his “ Man 
before Metals,’ said that the Assyrians, the Gaunches of the 
Canary Islands, and the Peruvians practised the same form of 
interment. One peculiar feature of the Harlyn Bay interments 
was that most of the bodies were placed with the head pointing 
north, or to be more correct, according to the observations of 
Mr. Mallett, “‘the magnetic north.” Considering that this was at 
a period prior to the invention of the mariner’s compass, it was 
remarkable, but not very easy of explanation, except by reference 
to the Pole Star. 
Most of the skeletons were resting on the left side; the right 
temporal bone was smashed in, presumably post mortem, in order 
that the spirit might have free exit on its way to the “ happier 
hunting ground.”’ For this journey certain provisions seemed to 
have been made. In some cists a stone weapon for protection 
was found, also materials that might be used for striking a light 
or making a fire, such as flint, felspar, and a sort of charcoal, 
placed usually on the abdomen or near the head. Often, and 
especially in a cist occupied by a lady, there was found a lump of 
crude oxide of iron for colouring and decorative purposes ‘‘ when 
they got there.” In case he should be doing the fair sex an 
injustice, the lecturer quoted from a German authority, the Ueber 
Land and Meer, published at Stuttgart, which, after describing a 
newly-discovered pre-historic burial field, near Worms, went on to 
say that “one find, near the top of the grave where there were 
no weapons, was most remarkable; it was a highly polished 
reddish stone, which, on closer examination, proved to be a lump 
of oxide of iron. Can it be that the dwellers on the ‘ Adlerberge,’ 
near Worms, had practiced the same custom as the ‘ Nadovessier,’ 
to whom Schiller attributes, in their death lament, these words : 
* Colour, too, to paint the body, 
Lay ye in his hand, 
That with red he be resplendent 
In the spirit land.’ ” 
There were also evidences of a meal of food being left near 
the mouth. A slide, which the lecturer here showed, seemed to 
confirm this suggestion. A limpet shell was strongly adherent to 
the jaw of the skull, at about the angle of the lower lip. 
The specimen in question was obtained at a deep level, resting on 
the left side, and when Mr. Mallett teased the sand carefully out 
of it he considered that it pointed to the probability that after 
death a handful of limpets and cockles might have been placed 
near the mouth to ease the mind of the dead man’s friends as to 
the need of refreshment, and that the limpet formed an 
