s commonplace, vulgar and
inartistic, when compared with the work of the old Irish period.
Torques, or twisted ribbons of gold, of varying size and shape, were
worn as diadems, collars, or even belts; crescent bands of finely
embossed sheet-gold were worn above the forehead; brooches and pins of
most delicate and imaginative workmanship were used to catch together
the folds of richly colored cloaks, and rings and bracelets were of not
less various and exquisite forms.

We are at no loss to understand the abundance of our old goldsmiths'
work when we know that even now, after being worked for centuries, the
Wicklow gold-mines have an average yearly yield of some five hundred
ounces, found, for the most part, in nuggets in the beds of streams
flowing into the two Avons. One mountain torrent bears the name of Gold
Mines River at the present day, showing the unbroken presence of the
yellow metal from the time of its first discovery, over three thousand
years ago. It seems probable that a liberal alloy of gold gave the
golden bronze its peculiar excellence and beauty; for so rich is the
lustre, so fine the color of many of our bronze axes and spears, that
they are hardly less splendid than weapons of pure gold. From the
perfect design and workmanship of these things of gold and bronze, more
than from any other source, we gain an insight into the high culture and
skill in the arts which marked that most distinctively Irish period,
lasting, as we have seen, more than two thousand years.

Early in this same epoch we find traditions of the clearing of forests,
the sowing of cornfields, the skill of dyers in seven colors, earliest
of which were purple, blue and green. Wells were dug to insure an easily
accessible supply of pure water, so that we begin to think of a settled
population dwelling among fields of golden grain, pasturing their cattle
in rich meadows, and depending less on the deer and wild oxen of the
forest, the salmon of lake and river, and the abundant fish along
the shores.

Tradition speaks persistently of bards, heralds, poets and poetesses;
of music and song; of cordial and generous social life; and to the
presence of these bards, like the skalds of the Northmen, we owe
pictures, even now full of life and color and movement, of those days
of long ago.

At a period rather more than two thousand years ago, a warrior-queen,
Maca by name, founded a great fort and citadel at Emain, some two miles
west of Armagh,