PRE-HISTOMC DWELLINGS. 
367 
artificial base, winch has been regarded by some archaeologists 
as the first process in the building of these structures.” 
An excellent memoir upon this Drumkeerey crannoge has 
been lately read before the Society of Antiquaries, by Pro- 
fessor Harkness. He describes the basement of the structure 
as consisting of several thousands of birch-poles, covered with 
the original bark, having a wedge-shaped end driven into the 
ground in close proximity to each other. Later in the history 
of the dwelling this foundation was repaired by a number of 
oak slabs pointed at the lower end. The shape of the cran- 
noge was pyriform. Inside the piling appears evidence of a 
floor laid with stones and earth brought from the mainland 
to the island. Hear the centre of the crannoge are the 
remains of fireplaces formed of immense blocks of stone, sur- 
rounded with large quantities of charred wood and fragments 
of bones. Remains of coarse pottery were also found, also 
beads of amber and glass, stone rings, and a corn-crusher 
of ruder form than a quern. The entrance was strengthened by 
two rows of piles, from the outer end of which a stockade seems 
to have run. Many crannoges of similar design have been 
met with in Ireland, and described by the local archaeologists ; 
but as the Drumkeerey one illustrates that principle of forma- 
tion which I believe to the true one, I have chosen it as a 
type of the class. Lacustrine human habitations have lately 
(1863) been discovered in Dowalton Loch, Wigtonshire; upon 
these Lord Lovaine read a paper at the Newcastle meeting of 
the British Association. This loch having been drained, arti- 
ficial islets were found in it, staked out by piles strengthened 
with stones, the foundations of dwellings formerly above the 
water- surface, but afterwards, by the growth of peat, and pro- 
bably also physical changes in the district, sunk below it. 
There is every probability of lake- settlements existing in 
many of our shallow English lakes, if observation was directed 
to their discovery. 
We now pass on the lake habitations of Switzerland, more 
than 160 of which have already been found. So much has 
been written about them within the last few years, and 
so generally are their characteristics known, not only to 
the scientific world, but also to the reading public, that a 
resume of the investigations of Morlot, Keller, Lyell, Lubbock, 
Desor, Schwab, Forel, Ullmann, Colonel Suter, Gillieron, 
Troyon, and Bo chat appears to me scarcely necessary. Sir 
C. Lyell has exhibited, as the frontispiece to his (t Antiquity 
of Man,” a restoration of a group of these dwellings, after a 
design by Rutimeyer, showing their probable near affinity in 
character to the beehive-shaped huts, elevated upon piles, 
slightly above the shallow waters of the Papuan archipelago. 
