Brown K — Ethnography of the Mullet, Inishkea, ^ Tortacloy. 639 



his death to his interference with this figure. An Inishkea man spoke 

 about the matter with much indignation even after the lapse of 

 years, and said that they had never known misfortune or hunger in 

 the island until after the distraction of this neewoge. 



Many different accounts have been given of the image itself. One 

 writer (C. 0.) states that it was a stone figure of rude workmanship, 

 and that it was dressed in a suit of homespun, renewed every year. 



The description given by those who have seen it agree in stating 

 that it was not a statue but a small flat stone. One informant believed it 

 to be part of the head of a stone figure. This was enveloped in a 

 small bag of homespun, which was replaced when it got old and 

 soiled, and was kept in a blind window or recess in the wall in one of 

 the houses. 



St. Brendmi and the Devil. — During my visit to Inishglora some 

 of the Inishkea fishermen, who were camped there at the time, pointed 

 out that no grass grew on a part of the island, and gave the following 

 explanation : — St. Brendan was one day disturbed in his devotions by 

 the devil, who appeared to him in the form of a beautiful girl and 

 tempted him. The saint indignantly repulsed the temptress, and 

 drove her towards the end of the island, blessing the soil as he went, 

 but at the point where the grass ends, Satan changed his form and 

 assumed the shape of a ram, which so astonished the saint that in his 

 excitement he ceased blessing and gave chase to the evil one who ran 

 to the rocks and jumped into the sea. The unblessed land is that on 

 which the grass does not grow. 



YI. ARCH^OLoer. 



The few notes made in this section do not purport to be fully 

 descriptive, but merely to indicate the nature of the antiquities of 

 the region, which are of importance in the study of the people as 

 bearing on the history of their past, and to direct the attention of 

 archaeologists to the quantity of material worthy of study and record 

 which is still to be met with in this part of county Mayo. 



1. Survivals. — The district is comparatively rich in these, though 

 many articles in use in the localities previously reported on are now 

 quite extinct in Erris. The primitive condition of many of the 

 houses, the absence of chimneys, and the custom of taking cattle into 

 the dwellings have already been referred to. 



The quern is still in use in several houses, especially on the 

 islands and in the remoter localities, though now only employed for 



R.I. A. PROC, SEE. III., VOL. III. 2 V 



