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on the plain of Magh-sleacht, in Breffny, near Fenagh, a parish. in the barony of Mohil, being killed by lightning.

The fires which were lighted on hills were conceived to have a purifying quality, and on this account the Irish generally drove their cattle through them.

As the monument at New Grange formed one alteration from the original construction of the Druidical temples, so the firetowers intended to supersede the lighting of fires on hills made another. As these were conical, and ending in a point at top, the idea seems to have been, in the opinion of Irish antiquaries, derived from the pyramidal plane: they were built of stones without mortar. In Smith's History of Kerry, there is a plate of one, which is twenty feet long, ten feet broad, and twenty feet high, and its walls four feet thick. "It may be asked,' says Colonel Vallancey, "since the Pagan Irish could chissel stones for the round towers, why are the Ogum inscriptions on rough unhewn rocks? The reason is, because such inscriptions were Mithratic; they allude to Mithras, whose votaries pretended that he was sprung from a rock, and therefore the place where the mysterious ceremonies were communicated to the initiated was always a natural cave, or an artificial one, composed of unhewn stones, several of which exist in this country. Hence, the rude obelisk was dedicated to the sun, that is, to Mithras. It was not, therefore, the want of knowledge in working with tools, or of cements, that caused the Pagan Irish to construct their temples of rough materials. The fire temple, or tower, was an innovation, as we shall prove hereafter, and from the smallness of its diameter, and its height, it required the tool." The highest tower in Ireland is dedicated to Brigit, the daughter of Daghda, or Apollo. At Drom-bagh, temple of the sun, now Drom-boe, in the county of Down, are still the remains of a fire tower, which once blazed in honour of Bagh; and there are many other towers that, by their names, plainly indicate they were for this purpose. One of these is called Aoi-Beiltoir, the community of the towers of Belus, and this was a title of high dignity among the Pagan Irish. Wherever the word occurs in the Brehon laws, it is underlined by the commentator, and explained by the word Easbog, bishop. The fire tower, however, was not universally adopted by the Irish, as we learn from many oppositions made to it, which are recorded in history; and there were sectaries that still continued to light their fires on the mountains, and raised tumuli.

Perhaps, however, the most curious Arkite remains in Ireland are the ship-temples, of which that at Dundalk, and that in the

Collect. de Reb. Hib., vol. vi.

+ So O'Clery has Ata tu cu usbaid file le Ulltaibh, thou art the illustrious Urbaid (fire minister) of the Ultonians.

county of Mayo, are interesting specimens. The first of these is called Fags na ain eighe, the one night's work, and, except the projection which marks the head of the vessel, would be a perfect ellipse. It is composed of brownish grit-stone, the two or three first courses aboveground being from two to three feet broad, and from twelve to sixteen inches high, those of the superstructure of all sizes. It is made to bulge out on the sides, like a ship, and has along the inside, stones so placed as to form a seat all round. Its interior length is forty-four feet nine inches, and greatest breadth twenty-one feet. It had a door at its side, as the ark is said to have had, and it rests on a mount surrounded by a vallum. That near Mullet, on the western coast of the county of Mayo, is named Leabba na Fathach, the giant's bed, and, unlike the former, is still in a state of perfection. The walls are two feet thick, of well jointed stones, without cement. The ground-plan is exactly like a Welsh coracle, viz. a curvilinear triangle, the length within fifteen feet, and to the ceiling, seven. The door, which is on one side, is formed of two large converging upright stones, and an impost, resembling an Egyptian gateway. The roof is made of large flag-stones, with a grassy covering; and the temple itself stands on an insulated conical hill.

With every prosperous wish, Gentlemen,

I remain most truly yours,

(To be continued.)

SAMUEL R. MEYRICK.

INSCRIPTION

FOR AN OBELISK AT MORVA RHUDDLAN.

In the eighth century, this peaceful plain,

Where smile the meadows now, and wave the grain,
Then, wildly delug'd with the blood of man,
Was the far-fam'd field of MORVA RHUDDLAN

The British Golgotha!-Here Offa's word
Condemn'd man, child, and woman, to the sword,
While screams of agony and sobs of death
Where heard unheeded. Blessed is this wreath
That Peace has cast on gentle Elwy's bauks;
O, thanks for better days, Eternal Power, thanks!
MADOC MERVYN.

[THE following lines are a literal translation of a Welsh poem, written immediately after the Battle of Bosworth Field. They are interesting as affording so many allusions to the subjects of Walpole's historic doubts, though it is evident he did not take his views of the character or person of Richard III. from these Wesh words.]

TO HENRY THE SEVENTH.

BY DAVYDD LLWYD LLEWELYN AP GRUFYDD,

Who flourished from 1480 to 1520.

THE Crown is on the eagle's head;

If, indeed, the Mole and his host have bled.
King Harry hath fought, and bravely done,
Our friend, the golden crown, hath won.
The Bards resume a cheerful strain;

For the good of the world little R. was slain.
That straddling letter, pale and sad,
In England's realm no honour had:
For ne'er could R., in place of I‚†
Rule England's people royally;
Nor stem the foe with puissant hand,
Nor in the breach like Edward stand.
How odious the vile cur to spy,

With withered shank for brawny thigh,
Partake the banquet's circling cheer,

Where Gloucester's cunning cheats the ear!
Old London saw, in evil hour,

A Jew usurp the British power:

The boar on murder foul intent,

Brave Edward's sons in durance pent;

His tender wards, his nephews two,

By lawless ruthless force he slew.
Out on his Saracen's savage face!
Who angels killed of Christian race,
And brought by holy Non, the shame
Of Herod on one manly name!
I marvel that the wrath of heaven
Had not the earth beneath him riven:
The sainted Harry's murderous fall
With anger mov'd the Lord of all.
If Thursday night,§ his mortal pain
Beheld, the slayer now is slain.

"The Mole." Richard III. is called the Mole in allusion to his working by treachery or underground.

So Henry IV. is called the Mole

by Iolo Goch, in his ode to Owen Glendwr.

†The person of Richard III. expressed by the letter R is here contrasted with the tall upright form of Edward IV., expressed by the letter I. It may be observed that I. is the initial of the Welsh name for Edward, Iorworth: though the Bard in this place uses the English name Edward. It is, therefore, probable that the simile was not the invention of the Bard himself.

Non was the mother of Saint David, and a saint of great credit in Wales. § The 21st of May, 1471, upon the night of which Henry VI. was

If Richard his life-blood foully sought,
And like a Saracen murder wrought;
Though slowly wrath divine pursue,
It strikes no less in season due;
And God, who sees man's evil deed,
With heavy vengeance pays his meed.
To gain and fix his thorny crown,
(The London locusts* were his own,)
He smote the heads with felon hand
Of divers nobles of the land;

The heads of lords, of chiefs renown'd,
The duke's not one bright feather crown'd.
For this, at length, the cock o' the heatht
Abides the avenging stroke of death.
I thought to fly, but now he's dead,
I bless the man by whom he bled.
In a dirty ditch the dog lies low,

Good luck to the hand that dealt the blow;
The little boar hath ceased to live,
And greater alms no hand could give.
By cruel wiles he work'd his way;
Those wiles their author now repay.
His evil deeds but fruitless prove,
And wait their evil doom above.
He tried to soar, but tried in vain,
The old cock tumbled down again;
And great his fall, (but what care I?)
As Simon Magus't from the sky.
"Twas strange in sainted Harry's place
A prince to set of Saxon race.§
The saint would never chuse for heir
But kindred blood his crown to wear.
How grievous then of little ape,
On magpie's legs to crown the shape!
That crown to claim as he pass'd along,
I met a goat both swift and strong,
'Twas Harry, Harry is and shall be king!
Long life and health to Harry sing!

A SILURIAN.

murdered, appears to have fallen on a Thursday, and the anniversary of that event, in 1485, was the battle of Bosworth field, on the same day of the week. London locust, or caterpillar as the original signifies, meaning the venal citizens of London.

The Welsh expression of which this is a literal translation signifies grasshopper.

"Simon Magus." The old legends represent Simon Magus, after having obtained the power of working miracles, to have come to Rome, and there to have ascended into the air in a chariot, accompanied by two angels: but, upon the intercession of St. Peter and St. Paul, he was thrown down, and broke his legs in the fall.

§ The Bard, who was attached to the Lancastrians, on account of Henry VII.'s Welsh origin, treats the Yorkists as Saxons.

Henry VII. landed at Milford Liavcu, and passed through Wales in his way to Bosworth Field.

NUGE CAMBRO-BRITANNICA.

No. II.

A Plea for the Mother Tongue.

"Si quid novisti vectius istis,

Candidus imparti, si non, his utere mecum."

WITHOUT presuming to detract from the transcendent merits of our great English lexicographer, it must be admitted, that his Dictionary is more deficient in his Welsh etymologies than in any other part of that immortal work. Dr. Johnson either

passes over, without tracing to their source, a great number of words unquestionably derived from the ancient British, or he ascribes to them another origin from the Saxon, French, Dutch, or Danish languages.

This seems the more extraordinary, as the doctor has himself informed us that he was aided in this portion of his laborious compilation by the assistance of a native of the Principality, who had already distinguished himself by the publication of a collection of Welsh Proverbs. The Cambrian compiler, however, has manifested an evident, but unwarranted, partiality for Saxon derivations.

The Welsh were unquestionably the aboriginal inhabitants of this island. It is among them, then, that we must naturally seek for the fountain head of the English language. The AngloSaxon was little more than a conduit-pipe through which the rich stream of the ancient British flowed into the modern English, corrupted, indeed, in its course, by a forced and heterogeneous mixture with the Danish and the Norman-French. The Welsh is the only mother-tongue of Great Britain; and yet in England, upon all occasions, we observe a marked predilection in favor of Anglo-Saxon literature to the prejudice of the Welsh. The last century has seen an Anglo-Saxon professor installed in his academic chair in the University of Oxford; but no literary honours, no encouragements, have yet been offered for the study of the mother-tongue. The eastern languages have not been thus neglected. In addition to the other Oriental professors in both our Universities, the late Colonel Boaden, by a most liberal and laudable benefaction in his will, has recently founded at Oxford a professorship of the Sanscrit, between which, by the by, and the Welsh, there seems a very striking resemblance, as is known to be the case between it and the Hebrew, and all the derivative languages of the East. A more intimate connexion than is generally imagined will be found to exist between the

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