588 ANNUAL EEPOET SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION, 1910. 



were due to the wickedness of rulers. In the " Book of Leinster "" is 

 related that under Cairbre Cinnchait, who acceded' to the throne by 

 violence and caused the children of the nobles to be pitilessly killed, 

 each ear bore only a single grain, each oak only one cone. But when 

 the old dynasty was restored Ireland regained its fertility. To each 

 new king the Ollamh, the chief bard, chanted some verses, in which he 

 admonished him to reign well, else famine and disease would devas- 

 tate the land, and in a Welsh poem of the twelfth century is read: 

 " With false kings and [in consequence] failure of crops we Avill 

 have bad years and (long) days" (the Black Book of Carmarthen). 



We hear, besides, of many taboos which the Irish kings, even 

 in historic times, had to observe to keep off misfortune from the land. 

 (Book of Eights, pp. 3-8.) 



Thus the high King of Ireland in Tara must not be in his bed 

 when the sun rises. He must not settle on a Wednesday on Magh 

 Breagh, not cross Magh Cuillinn after sunset, not drive his horse 

 on Fan Chomair, not on Monday board a vessel in the water after 

 Bealltaine, nor must he on Tuesday after All Saints leave behind 

 traces of his army upon Ath Maighne. 



The King of Connaught must not make a treaty over his old palace 

 after he had concluded peace on All Saints Day (the 1st of Novem- 

 ber was a Celtic pagan holiday) ; he must not in variegated dress 

 ride on a gray-speckled steed to the heath of Dal Chais, or visit a 

 gathering of women at Graghais, or sit in the autumn upon the grave 

 of the wife of Maine, nor run a race between two stations at Ath 

 Gallta with the rider of a gray, one-eyed horse. 



Similar taboos had to be observed by the kings of Leinster, 

 Mmister, and Ulster. 



From this it follows that the kings of the Gaels, like the other Indo- 

 Europeans, evolved from priests, and we may conclude, since espe- 

 cially in Ireland the remembrance of it remained so fresh and dis- 

 tinct, that the kings of the Gaels when they conquered Ireland had 

 also been their priests. 



As archeology clearly shows, the Celts were obviously not the first 

 inhabitants of the British Islands, but had already found there an 

 aboriginal people. My own unprejudiced anthropological observa- 

 tions during a sojourn in Ireland have convinced me that we have on 

 Irish soil to do with two pre-Celtic, non-Indo-European races. 



One of these races, found chiefly in northern Ireland (also in Scot- 

 land), is of small, but well-proportioned stature (I was obliged to 

 stoop at almost every door in order not to knock my head), pre- 

 dominantly brachycephalic, with the lower half of the face of un- 

 usual length, the profile line running almost straight from the under 

 lip to the chin, swelled, thick lips, slightly prognathic, with black 

 wiry hair and dark eyes, resembling the Samoyeds; the women of a 



