366 AN OLD BONE. CHA?. xvn. 



He was struck by its size, thickness, and peculiar 

 shape. The idea flashed across his mind that 

 he had seen something like it in a picture ; but he 

 could not remember where. Seeing his intent glance, 

 the curator asked him if he knew anything about it? 

 " Nothing," said he, " except that it appears to me to 

 be a semi-fossilised bone of some of the pre-Adamite 

 monsters that are dug up now and then ; but what 

 it is I cannot tell." " It looks to me," said the 

 curator, "to be nothing more than the root of a 

 tree : in fact I am sure it is. If it were a bone, as 

 you say, surely some of the gentlemen composing the 

 Scientific Society would know." " Give it time," 

 replied Edward, " and some one will yet be* able to 

 tell us all about it." " Time indeed ! " said the curator, 

 "we have had it lying here far too long. I have 

 often thought of throwing it into the fire, and I will 

 do so when I have next the opportunity. It would 

 never have been here but for that old fool (naming a 

 previous curator), whose only aim seems to have been 

 to get the place filled up with useless trash." 



In the meantime the previous history of the bone 

 may be given. Some sixty years before, when a mill- 

 dam was being enlarged at Inverichny, in the parish 

 of Alvah, near Banff, one of the workmen came upon 

 a dark-looking object embedded in the bank amongst 

 clay and shingle, about six feet from the surface. 

 After being disengaged, it was found that the object 

 was very like a large hour-glass, though not tapering 



