surroundings, it seemed quite hopeless to penetrate to any extent into the mud or pulp in quest of discoveries. Similar cases of ‘finds’ could be multiplied many times; it is sufficient to state that in nearly every crannog hitherto discovered, and more or less explored in Ireland, articles formed of flint or stone, and similar in every respect to remains usually assigned to the Stone Age, have occurred, and in apparent connection with implements of bronze and iron. The necessity for the use of stone celts discovered in the lake-dwellings is not clear; for it is certain that the long clean cuts which appear on the ends of the pilings or stakes by which the islands are encircled, could only have been made with sharp metallic implements of the axe or adze kind. Such objects are very common in crannog remains; and some have been found furnished with well-steeled cutting edges, while the remainder of the head consisted of soft iron. The mortice-holes so often found in the framework of the islets, and in the larger timbers of the huts, were evidently worked out by the use of metal chisels, which may have been formed either of bronze or iron. The huts of Drumkellin and Kilnamaddo are perhaps among the earliest remains of lake-habitations yet found within the British Isles; but whatever claim they may have for classification among the earliest lake-dwellings of Central Europe, the Irish crannogs, as a whole, seem to have no such claim. And as regards these huts, ‘the relics,’ as Dr. Munro says, ‘are too few to justify such a sweeping conclusion as that these dwellings were constructed at a period when metal implements were unknown in the country. At any rate, there can be no reasonable doubt that the period of greatest development of the Scotch and Irish lake-dwellings was during the Iron Age, and at least as far posterior to Roman civilization as that of the Swiss Pfahlbauten was anterior to it.’[121] * * * * *