The cromlech is usually styled ‘Dolmen’ by English and Continental writers. Our peasantry, however, as a rule, call them ‘Giants’ Graves,’ or not unfrequently, when retailing a tradition and speaking in Irish, ‘Leaba Diarmida agus Graine,’ or the Beds of Dermot and Graine, from two historical personages who, according to an old legend, eloped together, and flying through the country for a year and a day, erected these ‘beds’ wherever they rested for a night. Graine, or Grace, was the betrothed wife of Fin Mac Coul, and daughter of King Cormac Mac Art, who lived about the middle of the third century A.D.; her lover was Diarmid O’Duibhne, of whom several stories are still current. According to this legend there should be just 366 cromlechs, or ‘beds,’ in Ireland. But mythical as the story is, it is nevertheless of some interest, as it connects the monuments with pre-Christian events. In parts of the north and west of the country they are sometimes styled ‘griddles.’ The true _Chamber Monument_ is an extended form of the cromlech, and differs from it in that the roof is formed by a succession of overlapping slabs resting on the stones forming the walls, and gradually rising from the lower end. The top cap-stone, while resting on the uprights, not only closes the chamber, but by its weight keeps in position the overlapping stones which help to support it. In some cases the covering stone of the cromlech seems to have slipped from its original position, and will be found with one end or side resting upon the ground. Du Noyer was of opinion, shared by the late Mr. Borlase, that this was originally the case in some examples, the builders having failed in their efforts to raise the ponderous table or covering stone, or to procure suitable supports. The position of the upper stone, or roof, is usually sloping; but its degree of inclination does not seem to have been regulated by any intention or design. This general disposition of the ‘table’ has been largely seized upon by advocates of the ‘Druids’ Altar’ theory, as a proof of the soundness of their opinion that these monuments were erected by the Druids for the purpose of human sacrifice. Some, indeed, have gone so far as to discover in the hollows worn by the rains and storms of centuries on the upper surface of these stones, channels artificially excavated, for the purpose of facilitating the passage of a victim’s blood earthwards!