und in France. In early times these were supposed to
have been rude altars used by the mysterious Druids in celebrating their
rites. They are now known to be the tombs of the Neolithic Age. They
are, in fact, the chambers above mentioned. The mound of earth has since
disappeared and left its chamber standing exposed to the air. Traces of
the old passage way are still met. Whether all Dolmens were once covered
with earth or not, is not yet known. In the majority of cases they
probably were. In the last cut portions of stone are still buried in the
earth. We are told that in India the people in some places still erect
Dolmens similar to those of Neolithic times.<32>

Illustration of Menhir.-------------

Illustration of Stone Circle, England.-------

Aside from the tombs themselves, there are other arrangements of great
stones which must have once possessed great significance to their
builders, but their meaning is now lost. Of this nature are the blocks
of rough stone set up in the ground generally in the vicinity of tombs.
These are the standing stones, or menhirs, which, as we have stated, are
arranged in various forms. When arranged in circles, they are generally
regarded as tombs. When placed in long parallel rows, as at Carnac,
in France, we are not sure of their meaning. We are told that the Hill
tribes of India to this day erect combinations of gigantic stones into
all the shapes we have here described.<33>

The peculiar shape of the burial mounds, with a passage way conducting
us to an interior chamber, or series of chambers, probably arose from
the belief entertained by many savage people, that the dead continue to
live an existence much like that when alive, and consequently the same
surroundings were deemed necessary for their comfort. So the tomb was
made similar to the house of the living. The ordinary Winter huts of the
Laplander are very similar in shape and size to the burial tumuli, and
amongst some people, as the inhabitants of New Zealand, the house itself
is made the grave. It was closed up and painted red, and afterward
considered sacred.

Illustration of Chambered Tomb, France.--------

So it may quite well be that the Neolithic inhabitants of Denmark,
"unable to imagine a future altogether different from the present, or a
world quite unlike our own, showed their respect and affection for the
dead by burying with them those things which in life they had valued
most; with women, their o