Each of these vessels has had its particular use. The first-named vessels, which are by far the most common, are always found to be stained with some decomposed matter on the inside of the bottom, and their use has undoubtedly been as _food vessels_. So also we may consider the second group to be _drinking vessels_. The food and drink which these two contained when they were buried have been intended for their owners in the new life to come, when food and drink would be again required. The vessels of the third kind are always found to contain remains of a body which has been cremated before burial—hence their name _cinerary urns_—and the last-named and smallest, which are found with them, have probably been used to hold the precious spark of fire which lit the funeral pyre. [Illustration: THE RUDSTON MONOLITH] Let us leave these howes and barrows and examine another example of the work of the Men of the Stone Age. Close to the wall of the village church at Rudston stands a huge upright stone, or monolith. Twenty-five feet is its height above the ground, and sixteen feet its girth, while it is said to be embedded in the ground as deep as it is high above the surface. Its weight is estimated as not far short of forty tons. What is it doing in a village churchyard, and who put it there? When and how was it placed where it now stands? [Illustration: THE EARLIEST KIND OF AXE USED IN EAST YORKSHIRE.] It is impossible to give any definite answers to these questions. A century ago, however, the village people answered them all very easily. The Devil, they said, objected to the building of the church, and flung this stone to destroy it before its completion. But his aim was not so accurate as it was intended to be, and the missile missed its mark. Asked for a proof of their wonderful story, they would point to the stone itself. There it was for everyone to see. What further proof could be needed?[4] Whether we believe this legend or not, two things are certain. First, that the stone is as old as the barrows in the surrounding wolds; secondly, that there is no rock of the same nature nearer to it than Filey Brig and the Brimham Rocks. Was it brought down by the great ice sheet and then erected by the men of the Stone Age to serve some purpose in their heathen rites, or did they bring it up from Filey or down from the hills of the North Riding on wooden rollers? Perhaps it is not more difficult to conceive of their doing this than of their raising such a huge barrow as that which stands unopened at the foot of Garrowby Hill—a mound 250 feet in diameter at its base and 50 feet in height. Footnote 4: The ‘Devil’s Arrows’ is the name by which three similar huge stones are known at Boroughbridge. IV. MEN OF THE BRONZE AGE. THE ANCIENT BRITONS.