"A gret stane this Kyng than had, That fore this Kyngis sete wes made, And haldyne wes a gret Jowale Wytht-in the Kynryk of Spayne hale. This Kyng bad this Symon ta That stane, and in-tyl Yrland ga, And wyn that land and occupy, And halde that stane perpetually. Fergus Erc son fra hym syne Down discendand ewyn be lyne In to the fyve and fyfty gre, As ewyne recknand men may se, Broucht this Stane wytht-in Scotland, Fyrst quhen he come and wane that land. * * * * * Now will I the werd rehers, As I fynd of that Stane in wers; _Ni fallat fatum, Scoti, quocumque locatum Invenient lapidem, regnare tenentur ibidem_."[116] The Lia Fail is believed to have served for many ages as the coronation throne of the monarchs of Ireland; and according to Irish bardic traditions, to have borne testimony to the divine right of sovereignty by roaring beneath the legitimate monarch when seated on it at his inauguration! It was removed to Scotland, and deposited at Icolmkil or Iona, for the coronation of Fergus Erc, or Mac Eark, a prince of the blood royal of Ireland;[117] from which it was finally translated to the Abbey of Scone, when the Scottic kings had extended their sovereignty over the ancient kingdom of the Picts. In Scotland it bore the name of the "King's Stone," and was regarded as the national palladium, until Edward I. in 1296, ordered it to be conveyed to Westminster as an evidence of his absolute conquest of Scotland.[118] But the evidence failed, and the older prophecy holds good that wherever that stone rests princes of Scottish blood shall rule the land, though the Lia Fail no longer gives audible testimony to the legitimate heir. It can hardly fail to impress the thoughtful mind, as a singular link between eras so widely severed, not by time only but by every social and political change, that the rude Tanist Stone belonging to a period dimly cognizable in the remotest past, still forms a part of the coronation chair of the British sovereign in Westminster Abbey. The use of the Tanist Stone is, like so many other primitive customs, of Eastern origin, and traceable to a very remote era. Thus when Abimelech was made king, it was _by the pillar which was in Shechem_;[119] and when Jehoash was anointed king by Jehoiada, _the king stood by a pillar, as the manner was_.[120] The standing stone appears indeed to have been the most sacred attestation of every solemn covenant between contracting parties, including that between the elected chief or king and his people; and hence the super-addition of those peculiar virtues supposed to attach to the ancient Scottic Lia Fail.