164 [l*foc. B.N.F.O. 



haven, with about sixteen farms, in 1784. Many attended 

 Divine service in the well-designed and well-built churches of 

 Carrigart. After lunch most of the party visited the ruined 

 church of Mevagh, which is, like many another, crumbling 

 out of existence. We often wonder if there will ever exist 

 in the Irish peasantry sufficient veneration for the temples in 

 which their fathers worshipped, to prompt them to give a 

 trowel-full of mortar to preserve in its place even one poor 

 stone. ^Its yard contains an old rudely-shaped cross and a 

 " lucky-stone," which 



■' In earlier age than ours 



Was gifted with the wondrous powers " 



of curing all the ills that flesh is heir to. But, as a native 

 remarked, "It's like the holy water — no use unless you believe 

 in it." We strongly suspect that the natives had no belief 

 in us, and removed the stone when they saw us coming. 

 Leaving the church, a detour was made along the coastline of 

 Mulroy Bay to visit the " inscribed rocks," which consist of a 

 small well-elevated ridge of " schists," worn quite smooth, 

 on which rudely-formed designs of concentric circles had 

 been cut by a now forgotten people. These bear a great 

 resemblance to some of the "inscribed stones" at Newgrange. 

 The President of the Dublin Field Club, Mr. Kane, claimed 

 for them an intended use as surveys or maps of the raths or 

 strongholds of the chiefs or kings of the time, marking out 

 the limit of territory reigned over and defended by such forts. 

 This conclusion was suggested to him by some similar stones 

 in Kerry, on which he detected an erasure of one ornament 

 or fort, and evidently by tools such as worked the existing 

 circles, and this obliteration he attributed to the striking off 

 the " map " of a lost possession. How far this theory can be 

 maintained we leave Mr. Kane to work out. 



We regret that these primeval ornamentations are fast 

 being worn away by people sliding over them ; they will, like 

 the church, soon be lost unless protective measures are 

 adopted. 



