444 



very of lost property. For this purpose it used to be hired out by the 

 keepers under the following terms : — The borrower, before it was com- 

 mitted to him, paid down a certain fee in silver ; he then took an oath 

 on the bell that he would safely return it within a certain time, and that 

 while in his possession it should never touch the ground, or pass out of 

 human hands. In consequence, it was customary for the person who 

 borrowed it, when he required to be disengaged, to place it in the hands 

 of a second person, and so on ; and when night came, the family used 

 to sit up, or the neighbours to be collected as at a wake, so that when 

 one was tired holding it, another might relieve him, and thus fulfil, till 

 the period of the loan had expired, the terms of the oath, that it was 

 never to pass out of the hand of man. 



The Primate purchased it, some twenty- three years ago, from one of 

 the O'Eorkes, whose wants, coupled with the declining veneration for 

 the article, led him to dispose of it. 



Dimensions :— Height, 10 inches; breadth at shoulders, 5 inches; 

 breadth at mouth, 7 J inches ; depth at top, 2^ inches ; depth at mouth, 

 4f inches. Material : — Iron, much corroded. 



1^0. 3. — The Barry Gariagh. 



This bell was bought by the Primate, from a pedlar, at his own gate, 

 when rector of Drum. It had been obtained somewhere in Connaught, 

 by this itinerant dealer, during the famine year, when hunger severed 

 many strong ties. It bore the name of the Earry Gariagh ; and, if I be 

 allowed a conjecture, I would conclude from the name that it was a bell 

 belonging to St. Be'rach, of Termonbarry, in the county of Eoscommon, 

 and that it is the one which is said, in his Life, to have been given to 

 him by Dagseus, the artificer : Igitur discedenti (S. Eeracho) baculum 

 seu pedum dedit, quod Hibernice EacuUh-gearr, id est, baculus brevis ; 

 et cymbalum, quod Clog-beraigh ; id est, tintinnabulum Eerachi voca- 

 tur, quod Cluan-dalachise usque in hodiemum diem asservatur."^' 



Dimensions. — Height, 7 in. ; width of mouth, 7 in. ; depth ditto, 

 4f in. ; breadth of shoulders, 3f in. ; height of handle, 1-^ in. ; span of 

 handle, 2-^ in. Material : — ^Eronze, cast. 



1^0. 4. 



This bell is of bronze, and belonged to one of the old churches in the 

 county of Monaghan, the name of which I have not been able to ascer- 

 tain. Eut it was sold lately at Monaghan, among the effects of a medi- 

 cal man, who was an extensive collector, and a large portion of whose 

 Irish antiquities have passed into the possession of the Lord Primate. 



Dimensions : — Height, 7 J in. ; breadth of shoulders, 3 J in. ; breadth 

 at mouth, 6 J in. ; depth at mouth, 5 in. 



l^To. 5. — Clog-na-righ 

 I take this opportunity of exhibiting also a drawingf of the famous 



* Colgan, Supplem. Vit. F. Berachi, 15 Feb., " Act. SS.," p. Mba. 

 f Copied from an exact drawing of the original by the late Myles J. O'Reilly, made 

 in November, 1830. 



