Knowles — Report on Prehistoric Remains. 
185 
true explanation. During the accumulation of many feet of sandy- 
covering, the surface would become a little higher every year, and 
many an object might be dropped in passing over the hills which 
would become, in a short time, buried up ; but this, if the entire 
covering was at a later time blown away, would drop down to the 
! level of the old surface and appear among the flints. "We learn, too, 
rfrom old inhabitants, that many years ago the sand-hills, in some 
1 parts, were occupied by smugglers and illicit distillers. At Craigmore, 
tthe place was pointed out to me where they had a hut in the sand, 
land carried on the process of distillation. In this case many things 
'iWould, no doubt, be left behind to confuse investigators. Again, we 
ifind that it was a custom among those who practised cremation to 
ibury in sand-hills. Possibly it was because they were in the form of 
imounds, and not because they were composed of sand. I can point to 
many cases in the neighbourhood of Ballymena where sepulchral urns 
lhave been found close to the surface in natural sandhills. This 
[practice of burying on mounds extended to other countries. In 
lEngiand we have frequent mention of secondary interments on 
ibarrows, and on the Continent we find there was a desire to bury on 
[former sepulcliral mounds. Engelhardt says it is a remarkable fact 
Ethat urns have very frequently been buried in the sides of barrows 
(belonging to the preceding or stone age.^ I have no doubt that the 
rounded hillocks of sand in the sandhills would be selected as places 
sfor depositing urns, and in cases where the sandy covering would be 
carried away by the wind, an urn with its contents would fall down 
land become mingled with the flint implements of an earlier date. I 
lam of opinion that the presence of bronze pins, and some other objects, 
found in the sand-hills may be accounted for in this way. 
In all the stations I have mentioned the people seemed to have an 
instinct for working in stone. They wrought almost any material 
that came in their way : flint, if it could be had, but if not, then any 
hard rock that occurred in the district. At "Whitepark Bay, where 
one would have expected that, owing to flint being so plentiful, they 
would have confined themselves to that material, we find that they 
wrought the altered lias, and even made cutting implements of the 
jhardened chalk. At Portstewart and Dundrum they used several 
substances besides flint. At Dunfanaghy they used quartzite ; at 
Eundoran chert; and at Stredagh we find how they have practised on 
la rather untractable pebble of quartz. I have seen no evidence that 
^ Denmark in the Early Iron Age, p. 2. 
