68 Proceedings of the Royal Irish Academy. 
fig. 1). Before its decay it must have measured 14 feet in cir- 
cumference. ; 
This fragment, or stool, of the tree was two feet above the level 
of the floor of the hut; its roots penetrated down through the stratum 
composed of clay, stones, charcoal, ashes, &c. (this layer is represented 
in Fig. 1). When this stool was uprooted, chips of oak, charcoal, and 
kitchen-midden debris were found entangled in its rootlets, thus 
affording convincing evidence of the fact that this Irish kraal existed 
before the period when bog pine flourished in this locality. 
Several farmers who live close to the bog told me that the oak 
timber which formed the huts was like that grown in upland soil, and 
was quite different from the ordinary black bog-oak. 
Having excavated a trench 17 yards from the first hut, just 
as was anticipated, we struck a second one, composed of timbers 
much more massive than that of the first, but as rudely shaped as 
could possibly be. 
When the peat was cautiously removed from its interior I had it 
sketched (Fig. 3). Its form is rectangular, measuring inside six 
feet nine inches by six feet three inches, and eleven feet ten inches 
from ‘out to out.’? Three planks were placed lke railway sleepers 
before each end of the hut, at the level of the floor; they rested on 
branches of trees. 
From the number of burnt fragments found on the floor, it would 
appear probable that the roof was demolished by fire. Fragments of 
oak slabs (principally the ends) were found, some with one and 
others with two holes cut through them near the end; these holes 
were from two to three inches in diameter. These planks were 
about 14 inches broad, and two inches thick. The height of 
the roof could not be accurately ascertained, but a close approxima- 
tion was arrived at, owing to the fact that one of the side posts, 
which evidently carried the roof, was found still erect om situ; it was 
inserted into a hole in the end of one of the planks which composed the 
floor (Fig. 3). The upper end of this post was slightly sharpened. 
T found that all the ends of the planks which I believe formed the 
roof had holes, into one of which probably the upper end of this post 
was inserted; if this be correct, the interior of the hut could not 
have been more than a Little over four feet high. 
The framework of this structure consisted of four posts of oak, 
some of them measuring nearly 30 inches in diameter; they 
reached down into the ancient lake-mud. Their tops were decayed 
down to within 16 inches or so of the floor. A horizontal oak 
beam, as in the former hut, passed through each pair of posts. Oak 
planks, six and a-half feet long, stretched across from side to side, 
supported at each side by the oak beams, so that the whole resembled 
somewhat a common wooden bedstead, minus the ecross-bars of wood 
which bind the two sides together at head and foot. 
Two large logs, or trunks, of oak trees rested horizontally against 
