monks practised the choral
performance of rhythmical hymns. Colgan supplies the proof, which we
select from one of the Latin hymns of St. Columba:--

"Protegat nos altissimus,
De suis sanctis sedibus,
Dum ibi hymnos canimus,
Decem statutis vicibus."

Mr. O'Curry gives the names of all the ancient Irish musical instruments
as follows:--_Cruit_, a harp; _Timpan_, a drum, or tambourine; _Corn_, a
trumpet; _Stoc_, a clarion; _Pipai_, the pipes; _Fidil_, the fiddle. He
adds: "All those are mentioned in an ancient poem in the Book of
Leinster, a MS. of about the year 1150, now in the Library of Trinity
College. The first four are found in various old tales and descriptions
of battles."

We shall find how powerful was the influence of Irish music on the Irish
race at a later period of our history, when the subject of political
ballads will be mentioned.

The dress of the rich and the poor probably varied as much in the
century of which we write as at the present day. We have fortunately
remains of almost every description of texture in which the Irish Celt
was clad; so that, as Sir W. Wilde has well observed, we are not left to
conjecture, or forced to draw analogies from the habits of
half-civilized man in other countries at the present day.

In the year 1821 the body of a male adult was found in a bog on the
lands of Gallagh, near Castleblakeney, county Galway, clad in its
antique garb of deerskin. A few fragments of the dress are preserved,
and may be seen in the collection of the Royal Irish Academy. Portions
of the seams still remain, and are creditable specimens of early
needlework. The material employed in sewing was fine gut of three
strands, and the regularity and closeness of the stitching cannot fail
to excite admiration. It is another of the many proofs that, even in the
earliest ages, the Celt was gifted with more than ordinary skill in the
execution of whatever works he took in hand. After all, the skin of
animals is one of the most costly and appreciated adornments of the
human race, even at the present day; and our ancestors differ less from
us in the kind of clothes they wore, than in the refinements by which
they are fashioned to modern use. It is stated in the old bardic tale of
the _Tain bo Chuailgne_, that the charioteer of the hero was clothed in
a tunic of deerskin. This statement, taken in connexion with the fact
above-mentioned, is another evidence that increased knowledge is dai