1. As the first of these I take the free use of copper for large utensils (pp. 274-277). We have also the analysis supplied by Dr. Percy of a sword and a vase-handle of bronze (pp. 372-5). In my judgment, we have no sign whatever from the Poems of the fusion of metals together as a domestic practice; while we have abundant proof of the importation and foreign production of works of art and implements in bronze. This vase, then, may probably have been foreign. The same is likely with respect to the sword. We know that swords were exported and imported between different countries. Thrace was a seat of manufacture both for fine works of art (_Il._ XXIV. 234) and for weapons (_Il._ XXIII. 808): and we find a sword, "beautiful and long," from Thrace, in the possession of the Trojan Prince Helenos (_Il._ XIII. 577). Moreover, copper was an abundant metal, tin a rare one. Bronze weapons, therefore, must have been expensive. And the swords of bronze found in the tombs, in conjunction with all other costly objects, are just where we should have expected them. Even so at Hissarlik, two battle-axes found in the Treasure, and presumably belonging therefore to distinguished persons, were of bronze.[8] But axes made of pure copper may be seen in the Museum of the Irish Academy; and the great layer of copper-scoriæ at Hissarlik, without any tin, seems effectually to show that copper was the staple metal of the heroic period, and that our archæologists will have to insert a copper age in their lists, between their age of stone and their age of bronze. If weapons of copper were to be discovered in the tombs at Mycenæ, no circumstance could more enhance the proofs afforded by the Poems of the general use of copper; because the weapons in the tombs are weapons of the persons most likely to be able to command the use of bronze. I hope that the analysis, already begun, will be applied to a much larger number of objects. In the meantime, as to large utensils, I find the discoveries already in close correspondence with the Poems.