164 KEY. G. H. HALL OS A BARROW 



projected, as we may suppose, for the purpose of suspending the 

 vessel in the wattled house-circle of the departed British chief. 

 In it also was a dark incrustation which might possibly he the 

 prepared corn or foocLprovided hy filial or friendly piety for the 

 sustenance of his enfranchised spirit in his journey to Annwn, 

 the land of shades. This cist, besides pointed chippiugs of stone 

 which a few years ago might have ranked as a rude kind of wea- 

 pon, held towards the head a small flint knife, one and five- 

 eighths of an inch long, by one inch wide in the widest part. I 

 took it at first for an arrow-head, hut there was no sufficient 

 equipoise in its construction to carry it in a straight direction 

 from the bow, being in this respect very different from the accur- 

 ately formed arrow-heads in Mr. Greenwell's collection. The 

 marks of human art and work are plain on one side in bringing 

 it hy a series of blows to a sharp edge. On the top of the bar- 

 row, close to the central cist, was also found another implement 

 of chert, or limestone-flint — probably the so-called "thumb-flint" 

 of Celtic antiquaries. The latter is a little peculiar in being not 

 only chipped along one rounded side, but apparently ground by 

 friction to a smooth surface around the other, instead of being 

 struck off at one blow. The sharply defined end for use has been 

 thus formed, and no doubt served the self-same purpose which 

 such rude instruments subserve at this clay among the Esqui- 

 maux — that is, to sharpen and smooth pointed implements of bone 

 for dress, for fishing, or the chase, or even for their primitive 

 weaving. Various chippings and fragments of flint and chert 

 were also found on or near the harrow, cast there, perhaps, as 

 part of the funeral rites ; some of a yellowish colour, but mostly 

 of the dark natural hue of the pure nodule with its encrustation 

 of chalk. Mr. George Tate, of Alnwick, informs me, that the 

 only part of Northumberland where flint occurs is in this valley ; 

 and that he found specimens of true flint in Lewis Burn, and a 

 small boulder in the Whickhope Burn. He thinks that the pri- 

 mitive vale-dwellers obtained their supply from deposits in situ 

 in the valley itself, and not far distant from the spots where 

 they are found. A great number of flint chippings were cer- 

 tainly discovered in an ancient British camp at Pasture House, 



