The supposed modifications attributed to the laziness or incompetence of British craftsmen are, however, so astonishing and so ably executed that I am convinced the present theory of feeble imitation is ill-founded. The horses of Philippus are comparatively stiff and wooden by the side of the work of Celtic craftsmen who, _when that was their intention_, animated their creations with amazing verve and _elan_. Mr. W. Carew Hazlitt, who regards our early coins as "deplorable abortions," laments that one remarkable feature in the whole group of numismatic monuments of British and Celtic extraction is the spirit of servile imitation which it breathes, as well as the absence of that religious sentiment which confers a character on the Greek and Roman coinages.[409] How this writer defines religious sentiment I am unaware, but in any case it is difficult to square his assertion with Akerman's reference to "the great variety of crosses and other totally uninteresting objects" found on the _post_-Roman coinage.[410] We have already noted certain exquisitely modelled coins of Gaul and there are many more yet to be considered. Dr. Jewitt concedes that the imitations were not always servile "having occasionally additional features as drapery, a torque round the neck, a bandlet or what not," but this writer obsequiously follows Sir John Evans in the opinion that the stater of Philip was "seized on by the barbarians who came in contact with Greek civilisation as an object of imitation. In Gaul this was especially the case, and the whole of the gold coinage of that country may be said to consist of imitations more or less rude and degenerate of the Macedonian Philippus."[411] [Illustration: FIG. 235.--Cambre Castle, from Redruth. From _Excursions in the County of Cornwall_ (Stockdale, F. W. L.).] In 1769 a hoard of 371 gold British coins was discovered on the Cornish hill known as Carn Bre, near Cambourne, in view of which (and many other archæological finds) Borlase entertained the notion that Carn Bre was a prehistoric sanctuary. This conclusion is seemingly supported by the near neighbourhood of the town Redruth which is believed to have meant--_rhe druth_, or "the swift-flowing stream of the Druids". It is generally supposed that primitive coins were struck by priests within their sacred precincts,[412] and the extraordinary large collection found upon Carn Bre seems a strong implication that at some period coins were there minted. We find seemingly the Bre of Carn Bre, doubtless the Gaulish _abri_ or sanctuary, recurrent in Ireland, where at Bri Leith it was believed that Angus Mac Oge, the ever-young and lovely son of Dagda Mor, had his _brugh_ or _bri_, which meant _fairy palace_. The Cornish Cambourne, which the authorities suppose to have been _Cam bron_, and to have meant _crooked hill_, was more probably like Carn Bre the seat or _abri_ of King Auberon, "Saint" Bron, or King Aubrey.