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224 connected with the battle wished to be buried near his companions who fell there, and prepared this last resting-place for himself, but we must know more before such speculations can be of much value.

One other point is of interest regarding this tomb. If the minor sepulchres at Brugh were like the one flush with the surface, we cannot guess how many may yet be there undiscovered, and equally difficult to say how they are to be disinterred.

It is extremely difficult to write anything that will be at all satisfactory regarding the few standing solitary dolmens of Ireland. Not that their history could not be, perhaps, easily ascertained, but simply because every one has hitherto been content to consider them as pre-historic, and no one has consequently given himself the trouble to investigate the matter. The first point would be to ascertain whether any of them exist on any of the battle-fields mentioned in the Irish annals. My impression is that they do not: but this question can only be answered satisfactorily by some one more intimately acquainted with the ancient political geography of Ireland than I can pretend to be. No connexion has, however, yet been shown to exist between them and any known battle-fields, and till this is done, we must be content to consider them as the graves of chiefs or distinguished individuals whose ashes are contained in the urns which are generally found under them.

A still more important question hinges on their geographical distribution. Nothing can be more unsafe than to found any important deductions on what is known on this subject at present. If all those which are described in books and in journals of learned societies were marked on a map, the conclusion would be that the most of them are found on the east coast of Ireland; a dozen or so in Waterford and Wexford; as many in Dublin and Meath, and an equal number in County Down. But this knowledge may merely mean that the east coast, possessing roads and towns, has consequently been more frequented by tourists and antiquaries than the remote or inaccessible west.