Thus the early Sculptured Stones and the Hiberno-Saxon MSS. of Great Britain, and the Carlovingian Ivories afford a connecting link between the older symbolism of the primitive Christianity of the Catacomb period and the more strictly ecclesiastical art of mediæval times. Quite apart from the fact that King David was a type of Christ, and that his pictures formed the illustrations of the Psalter, it is not surprising that he should have been an object of popular worship amongst the warlike and musical Celts, to one side of whose character his heroic deeds in rending the jaws of the lion and slaying the giant Goliath, would appeal as strongly as his talent as a harper would to the other. A small MS. Irish Psalter in the British Museum (Vit. F. i.)[463] contains two very curious miniatures, one of David Playing the Harp and the other of David and Goliath.[464] The former is interesting, because I think it helps to explain the meaning of a figure sitting on the back of a beast and playing a harp,[465] sculptured on one of the panels of the cross at Clonmacnoise. As I hold, this is intended for David; and my reason for supposing this is, because the throne on which David is seated in the miniature in the Psalter is conventionally treated as a beast. [463] Westwood’s _Miniatures_, pl. 5. [464] In the miniature of David and Goliath in the Psalter David holds a sling in one hand and a beast-headed club in the other. The resemblance between this club and the beast’s-head symbol, which occurs on the Norrie’s Law silver ornaments and on several of the early incised slabs in Scotland, may be only accidental, but it is worth noting as a possible clue to the scriptural interpretation of the symbol. [465] O’Neil, pl. 24A. I am not quite sure whether the boat with men in it, on the stone at Cossins, is intended for Noah’s Ark or not, but a boat of just the same kind is represented on a carved wooden pillar at Olaf’s Church,[466] Nesland, where it is associated with other Scriptural subjects, amongst others the creation of Eve, Samson and Delilah, and David and Goliath. In this case there can be little doubt but that the boat is intended for Noah’s Ark, so that probably the boat at Cossins has the same meaning.