One other class of primitive relics remains to be noted, belonging to the same early period. These are the ornaments, weapons, and tools of horn or bone; such as the lances or harpoons already described as found alongside of the stranded whales in the alluvial valley of the Forth. Such relics are by no means rare, notwithstanding the perishable nature of the material of which they are constructed. Barry describes among the contents of the Orkney tumuli, "swords made of the bone of a large fish, and also daggers."[178] The woodcut represents what should perhaps be regarded as a bone dagger. It was found in a stone cist near Kirkwall, lying beside a rude urn, and is now in the possession of Dr. Traill. It measures 7½ inches long, and appears to be made of the outer half of the lower portion of the right metatarsal bone of an ox. The notches cut on it are perhaps designed to give a firmer hold, while they also serve the purpose of rude attempts at ornament. Their effect, however, is greatly to weaken the weapon and render it liable to break. The cross may perhaps suggest to some the associations of a later period, but little importance can be attached to so simple and obvious a means of decoration. Possibly indeed so far from its affording any indication of the influence of "the faith of the cross," it should be regarded like the incised patterns hereafter alluded to, wrought on later bronze implements, as suggestive of the use of the poisoned blade by the rude aborigines of the Stone Period. Pennant has engraved an implement of horn, carved and perforated at the thick end, found in a large urn under a cairn in Banffshire, and another, closely corresponding to it, was discovered in 1829, in a large urn dug up in the progress of the works requisite for erecting the Dean Bridge at Edinburgh.[179] A curious relic of the same class was brought to light on removing part of a remarkable cairn which still stands, though in ruins, on the summit of one of the Ochil Hills, on the northern boundary of Orwell parish, Kinross-shire. It bears the name of Cairn-a-vain, and an ancient traditional rhyme thus refers to a treasure believed to be contained in it:-- In the Dryburn well, beneath a stane, You'll find the key o' Cairn-a-vain, That will mak' a' Scotland rich ane by ane. [Illustration] Many hundreds of cart-loads of stones have been carried off by the proprietor from this gigantic pile, for the purpose of building fences, but no treasure has yet been found, though eagerly expected by the workmen. A rude stone cist occupied the centre of the pile, within which lay an urn full of bones and charcoal, and amongst these a small implement of bone, about four inches long, very much resembling in figure a cricket-bat notched on the edges.[180]