343 
first part of the first German edition of Ritter’s Geography * 
which gives an Eastern tradition in the form of an inverted 
history of the enmity between the first two brothers of man- 
kind, setting forth all the circumstances in a party spirit 
favourable to Cain. The tradition is current amongst the 
is budes, a race occupying a mountain district rich in minerals 
and is to the following effect That the elder brother 
acquired wealth by gold and silver mines, but that the 
younger becoming envious, drove him away, and forced him 
to take refuge m the East. ™ 
Moreover, wherever serpent- 
i iicicvc/i &urper 
worship was known, a serpent was in almost every case a 
guardian of treasure. * 
29 In the case of the wanderer and fugitive I have assumed, I 
have taken only purely rational grounds to account for a fea- 
ture at one time almost universal, even among the most widely 
ispersed races of the earth. But such grounds will not carry 
us through the question. y 
sem«,t I °-T eVer m plica . bl i e t0 river ma >' be the symbolical 
serpent, it would not be so to many places where serpent- 
worship was prevalent. Nor, on the other hand, could that 
worship have originated m the simple dread of the deadly 
power of the serpent in countries where serpents are not known 
to exist, as m Ireland. If the old legend of St. Patrick driving 
away serpents from Ireland is to be brought in argument 
against me, it would but strengthen my case, for not only do 
we find tins same tradition attributing to St. Columba the 
precise counterpart of that miracle in the island of Iona, but 
1S . Cle i. ar men addicted to serpent- worship, 
and not serpents themselves, were the fugitives. I may say 
that archaeological evidence exists to prove the case, as when 
the serpents, otherwise called devils, were said to have been 
rn 7, th ®T took refuge in Glen Columnkil, on the west 
coast of Donegal, from which, however, they were finally forced. 
This implies an interval; and that this desolate and re- 
mote region was occupied by a strong body of the holders 
of the ancient Celtic faith is clear from an accumulation of 
very remarkable dolmens which are there found. The absence 
of such reptiles in Ireland is remarkable, but their absence 
could certainly not have originated serpent-worship through 
fmm'’tlT hl 6 e '; ery r t UI !f artistio ° r reli S ious in old Irish designs, 
lid P n he w ?$ lderful filuminations in the Book of Kells to the 
tWf Cg ° d oruaments > represents the serpent, and indicates 
therefore some very strong religious idea being always upper- 
most in connection with it. J 
* Schlegel’s Philosophy of History, p. 95. 
