126 Proceedings of the Roi/al Irish Academy. 



are, perhaps, to be seen in a window reconstructed by the restorers, and 

 placed standing against the south wall of St. Cairain's nave (CNS 9).' This 

 window is represented in fig. 4 ; it is round-headed, with flat and late 

 mouldings. If it be really the east window of the church, it was 

 certainly a very late insertion. The light is 3 feet S\ inches high 

 and H| inches across. The two heads built into the sides of this 

 window have obviously no business there. There is a small I'ectaugular 

 siukiug, the purpose of which is not clear, in one of the stones on the sinister 

 side of this window ; one of the arched stones of the window-head is missing. 

 The head of another window, for which Jio place can now be found in any 

 building on the island, is lying close by (ONS 14). It was round-headed, 

 the light being 5i inches across; the window-head was decorated with a 

 saltire in relief, having a raised lozenge at the intersection, on the face of the 

 stone on the outer side. A drawing of it also will be found in fig. 4. There 

 is a small square aumbry in the chancel wall, on the south side, close to the 

 chancel arch. As has just been mentioned, there is a string-course, from 

 which depends a row of billets, running along the north and south sides of 

 the chancel, just under the place where the eaves of the roof came. 



Among the odds and ends preserved in the nave of the church are the 

 fragments of two gable-finials of the characteristic Irish type, with wings. 

 One of these, clamped to the west wall south of the doorway, bears a cross 

 potent in the middle, and had a triskelion in each apex of the wings. The 

 other (GNN 13), which is reduced to the merest fragment, also shows a 

 triskelion, and has the raised margin decorated with a Wall-of-Troy pattern. 

 These finials, which are sketched on Plate X, probably once surmounted the 

 gables of tlie nave. The coping of both gables, and the summit of the eastern 

 gable, had to be renewed in the Board of Works restoration. 



To determine the aspect of this building before its restoration, we liave the 

 Ordnance Survey Letters and Sketches ; some woodcuts in Pecrie's book ; 

 Brash's article in tlie " Gentleman's Magazine"; the account in Dunraveu's 

 "Notes," witli two excellent photographs; the Board of Woiks Eeport; and 

 some oral infoi-mation that I obtained on the spot. 



Petrie's drawing' sliows the chancel arch intact, but a great growth of 

 ivy hides the upper voussoirs. Behind and through the arch there is an 

 uninterrupted view of the lake scenery ; accordingly, the altar now standing 

 in the east end of the chui'ch, the east wall of the chancel, and the wall of the 

 Saints' Graveyard behind, all of whicli would now prevent such a view being 



' For aa explanation of these symbols, which indicate the position where an object 

 thus denoted is to be found on the island, see tlie bet;iniiing of section xiii. below, 

 - Ecclesiastical Architecture, p. 288. 



