"Westropp — Dolmens at Ballycroum, County Clare. 89 



-conceivably have been used for inserting offerings, but tbeir analogy to 

 the hole in the cover of the well of Slan is too doubtful for statement. 

 The holes so common in the sides of Indian dolmens are not of freq[uent 

 •occurrence in our island, and also the fact that at least several of the 

 dolmens with "scoops" were embedded in cairns and mounds renders 

 their use for offerings to the dead dweller in the cist still more uncer- 

 tain. 



There are two top slabs, the western overlapping the eastern, as is 

 sometimes the case in other dolmens ; the larger is irregular, its ex- 

 treme measurements are 7 feet 7 inches north and south by 7 feet 10 

 inches east and west, and about 18 inches thick. On the lower slab 

 rest a number of offerings of the poorest description — buttons, bottles, 

 broken glass and crockery, and two very rude wooden crosses, left by 

 those who resorted to the " well " for the cure of their eyes. 



O'Donovan found it in good repute in his day, but its reputation 

 has waned during the intervening sixty years, so fruitful of change in 

 weightier matters in this country, and so destructive of folk-lore and 

 traditional observance. As far as I could learn, a few old and poor 

 people come now and then ; but a neighbouring farmer's wife, living 

 less than a mile from the well, though she " had heard people talk 

 about the cures of Tubbergranny," and her own eyes were weak, had 

 never taken the trouble to visit it. 



Pinally, the " well " has no spring in it. I have visited in a wet 

 summer and in the autumn, and could only detect surface water or mud 

 inside. It used, I hear, to have water at all times, but as the peat 

 gets more and more cut away it is now practically dry at most seasons 

 of the year. J^o doubt when it was made on its little knoll a few feet 

 above the present sui'face of the bog the peat was not so high as in later 

 days, and now the older state of dryness is being restored. 



AxToiK Ultach is still understood by the peasantry to have de- 

 rived its name from a priest who fled from Ulster to a spot where the 

 penal laws were less powerful, and used to celebrate the Mass on this 

 dolmen, as a fellow-priest used to do on the dolmen of Kjiockshanvo, 

 on the hill of Knockaphunta beyond Broadford. The '* altar" stands 

 on a " saddle " (half way up the slope of one of the curious low rounded 

 knolls which surround the bog) and lies to the west of Tobergrania. 

 It commands a noble view through the gaps between the knolls over 

 the Lakeland of Central Clare, ^ with its bright blue streaks of the 

 Lakes of Cullaun, Kilgorey, Eosslara, and many others lying among 



' 1 liave Counted tliiitv Likes visible from another liill ;il ].ou<:?b Ea. 



