[Illustration: Sepulchral Chamber, Phœnix Park.] _Phœnix Park Cists._--The neighbourhood of Dublin furnishes many examples of these rude stone monuments of a prehistoric age. The ancient sepulchre situated in the Phœnix Park, Dublin, a little to the west of the Hibernian Military School, was discovered in the year 1838 by some workmen employed, under the Commissioners of Woods and Forests, in the removal of a tumulus which measured in circumference 120 feet, and in height 15 feet. During the progress of the work, four stone cists, or kistvaens, were exposed, each enclosing an urn of baked clay, within which were calcined bones and ashes, &c. One of these urns, which is now, with the skulls, shells, and other remains, in the Royal Irish Academy collection, arranged in a case in the National Museum, was fortunately saved in a nearly perfect state. The tomb at present consists of seven stones set in the ground, in the form of an irregular oval, three of which support a covering stone, which measures in length 6 feet 6 inches; in breadth, at the broadest part, 3 feet 6 inches; and in thickness between 14 and 16 inches. The spaces between the stones which formed the enclosure were filled with others of smaller size, which, since the discovery, have fallen out or been removed. The following is an extract from the report of the Academy:--‘In the recess they enclosed, two perfect male human skeletons were found, and also the tops of the femora of another, and a single bone of an animal supposed to be that of a dog. The heads of the skeletons rested to the north; and as the enclosure is not of sufficient extent to have permitted the bodies to lie at full length, they must have been bent at the vertebræ, or at the lower joints. In both skulls the teeth are nearly perfect, but the molars were more worn in one than in the other. Immediately under each skull was found collected together a considerable quantity of small shells common on our coasts, and known to conchologists by the name of _Nerita littoralis_. On examination these shells were found to have been rubbed down on the valve with a stone to make a second hole, for the purpose, as it appeared evident, of their being strung to form necklaces; and a vegetable fibre, serving this purpose, was also discovered, a portion of which was through the shells. A small fibula of bone, and a knife, or arrow-head, of flint, were also found.’