Dr. Hans Hildebrand, in his excellent South Kensington handbook of _The Industrial Arts of Scandinavia_ (p. 21), remarks that “every work of human art, higher as well as lower, has its shape determined by two agents: the end which it is to serve, and the taste of the people and the time of which it is a fruit.” In other words, there is a utilitarian as well as an ornamental side to almost every object fashioned by man to satisfy his wants. The form of an object must depend primarily upon the practical use to which it is intended to be put, and the decorative features generally follow afterwards in due course. The function of the decorative features, however, should be to add grace and beauty to the original form of the object, but not to attempt to disguise the utilitarian purpose it fulfils. No relics of antiquity are more deserving of study than personal ornaments, and of all personal ornaments perhaps the brooch is the most important as affording an insight into the character of the people by whom it was worn. Their ingenuity can be measured by the perfection of the mechanism of the working parts, their culture by the refinement of the ornament, and their skill as craftsmen by the finish of the workmanship. Much, again, is to be learnt of the habits of the people by investigating the different methods of wearing the brooch. Thus it is that almost every age and every country possesses its typical form of brooch. [Illustration: Pin-brooch from Clonmacnois, King’s Co. Now in the possession of the Rev. Timothy Lee, of Limerick Drawn by R. Cochrane, F.S.A.]