Ireland: Its Ancient Civilisation and Social Customs. 45 



The Brehon laws are most voluminous, and cover every possible 

 crime, to which adequate punishment was awarded. The duties 

 of the various classes of society, from the head king downward, 

 towards each other were clearly defined. There were laws 

 regulating the military system and defence of the country. 

 Laws dealing with engagements and bargains, and relating to 

 property entrusted or given in charge to others ; laws deaUng 

 with gifts, presents, and alms ; of loans, pledges, and securities; 

 laws stipulating the fees of doctors, lawyers, teachers, and judges, 

 and all other professional people ; laws dealing with trades, 

 such as weaving, spinning, building, and brewing; laws relating 

 to fosterage, and the relative duties of parents and children, of 

 foster fathers and foster mothers, including details respecting 

 the traming, food, and clothing of all children, from the King 

 down. A very complicated, yet clearly defined, series of laws 

 regarding landlords and tenants, master and servant, explaining 

 the various classes of lords, and of masters, and of servants, and of 

 tenants, and the origin and termination of tenancy and service. 

 They had schools, and orders of learned men equivalent to our 

 collegiate degrees, in addition to teaching the youth they recorded 

 historical events, and preserved the genealogies. They taught 

 the whole course of Gaelic literature in prose and verse. The 

 sons of the nobility, in addition to literature, were taught horse- 

 manship, chess, swimming, the use of arms, chiefly casting the 

 spear. Their daughters were taught sewing, cutting, and em- 

 broidery. The sons of the farming classes were taught the same 

 as the nobles, excepting horsemanship. When enumerating a 

 few of the ancient Brehon laws, I omitted one regarding a free 

 pass around the sea coast of Ireland. This law states — '' That 

 the space of the cast of a dart from high-water mark towards 

 the land shall be left for a road, which may be enclosed in by a 

 bank, one next the land, and the other next the sea." If the 

 Brehon laws were still in force in Ireland such an action as 

 that pending about the Causeway could not be brought. Several 

 Irish customs are similar to those of ancient Greece. Certain 

 families in both had cures for certain diseases, the receipt for 



