^45 



cattle on every opportunity, receive the strangers kindly, and 

 purchase from them hardware, jewellery, articles of dress, and 

 toys, in return for cattle and slaves. Now, just such a person 

 I suppose the possessor of this vessel to have been, and of this 

 very nation. Commerce was probably carried on in this 

 way along the shores of the Mediterranean, till the destruc- 

 tion of Tyre by Nebuchadnezzar destroyed it also for a 

 time, and then removed its most powerful centre of action to 

 Carthage. That state seems to have chiefly directed its 

 attention westward ; and it is a confirmation of my opinion 

 that the bronze trade was almost exclusively Phoenician, that 

 about this time the use of the alloy rapidly gave way to iron 

 and steel. In fact, the supply being cut ofl^ from Greece and 

 Asia by the ruin of the Tyrians, they were obliged to seek 

 other resources ; but in Ireland and other Atlantic lands the 

 traffic must have continued, nay, perhaps, even increased, in 

 consequence of that event, till the fall of Carthage finally cut 

 it off. 1 would also throw out another suggestion, though at 

 considerable risk of being thought a dreamer. We see in 

 Homer that the Phoenician traders were quite ready to have 

 recourse to violence when they could profit by it ; and, from 

 more historic sources, that, in Lybia and Spain, they took an 

 early opportunity of turning their factories into forts, and 

 enslaving the natives. Did the same thing happen here, when 

 the Tuatha De Danaan, a tribe rich in metallic ornaments 

 and weapons, subdued the ruder Firbolgs, who referred their 

 superior knowledge to magic? Were these shadowy person- 

 ages also Phoenicians ? Their name signifies " the tribe of 

 the gods of the Dani or Damni." If the first, it might indi- 

 cate Odin and his Asae ; but, besides that they must have 

 been far later, it seems highly improbable that such fierce 

 warriors would have been overpowered by any Celtic immi- 

 gration. If the second, the EHimni, the inhabitants of De- 

 vonshire and Cornwall, must have been completely under the 

 influence of the Phoenician agents, and may at first have ima- 



