oic-theach_,
from _teach_, a house, and _cloc_, the Irish word used for a bell in
Irish works before "the Germans or Saxons had churches or bells," and
before the Danes had ever sent a war-ship into our seas.

We pass readily from this ridiculous hypothesis with the remark that
the gossip which attributes to the Danes our lofty monumental pyramids
and cairns, our Druid altars, our dry stone caisils or keeps, and our
raths or fortified enclosures for the homes or cattle of our chiefs, is
equally and utterly unfounded; and is partly to be accounted for from
the name of power and terror which these barbarians left behind, and
partly from ignorant persons confounding them with the most illustrous
and civilised of the Irish races--the Danaans.

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[36] _The Transactions of the Royal Irish Academy_, vol. xx.
Dublin: Hodges & Smith, Grafton Street.

[37] A turbulent and learned Franciscan friar who figured in the
Confederation of Kilkenny.--C.P.M.

THEORY OF THE EASTERN ORIGIN OF THE ROUND TOWERS.

Among the middle and upper classes in Ireland the Round Towers are
regarded as one of the results of an intimate connection between
Ireland and the East, and are spoken of as either--1, Fire Temples; 2,
Stations from whence Druid festivals were announced; 3, Sun-dials
(gnomons) and astronomical observatories; 4, Buddhist or Phallic
temples, or two or more of these uses are attributed to them at the
same time.

Mr. Petrie states that the theory of the Phoenician or Indo-Scythic
origin of these towers was stated for the first time so recently as
1772 by General Vallancey, in his "Essay on the Antiquity of the Irish
Language," and was re-asserted by him in many different and contradictory
forms in his _Collectanea de Rebus Hibernicis_, published at intervals
in the following years.

It may be well to premise who

GENERAL CHARLES VALLANCEY

was. His family were from Berry, in France; their name Le Brun, called
De Valencia, from their estate of that name. General Vallancey was born
in Flanders, but was educated at Eton College. When a captain in the
12th Royal Infantry he was attached to the engineer department in
Ireland, published a book on Field Engineering in 1756, and commenced a
survey of Ireland. During this he picked up something of the Irish
language, and is said to have studied it under Morris O'Gorman, clerk
of Mary's Lane Chapel. He