21 



earlier season, with more time at command, would, doubtless, 

 well repay the botanical collector, and such a visit will be looked 

 forward to with equal interest by the antiquarians of the Belfast 

 Naturalists' Field Club. 



ABSTRACT OF PAPERS READ DURING THE 

 WINTER SESSION. 



The Winter Session was opened on the 5th December, when a 

 Paper was read by Mr. Geo. V. Du Noyer, M.R.I.A., entitled 

 " Notes on the Remarkable Discovery by Eugene Conwell, Esq., 

 M.R.I. A., of Sepulchral Megalicthic Chambers in Ancient Tumuli 

 on the Hill of Sleive-na-Caillighe, in the County Meath." 



The paper was illustrated by a series of about 130 water-colour 

 sketches of the various carvings on the stones forming the 

 chambers. 



Mr. Du Noyer remarked that Mr. Conwell's discoveries have 

 increased our knowledge of the pre-historic remains existing in 

 Ireland in a most remarkable degree, and his labours have tended 

 to give an impulse to our inquiries in this hitherto much over- 

 looked field of archaeological research. 



Our Scottish friends have for some years back been performing 

 great deeds in rescuing from oblivion those pre-historic sculptur- 

 ings either existing on pillar stones, or megalithic chambers, on 

 the walls of natural caves, or on natural rock surfaces. 



The publications of the Spalding Club, and those of the Society 

 of Scottish Antiquaries, Professor Wilson, Sir James Simpson, 

 George Tate, Esq., of Alnwick, and the late Duke of Northum- 

 berland, have given this subject a world-wide celebrity; yet so 

 far but little has been done by us in this branch of our national 

 antiquities at all commensurate with its ethnological value or the 

 richness of its stores. 



Mr. Conwell is desirous of publishing an exhaustive memoir 

 on the pre-historic antiquities of the County Meath, but the 

 funds of the Royal Irish Academy are so prescribed that a suffi- 

 cient outlay for that purpose from them could not be obtained 



