n amulet into court. Pliny had seen
this "egg." It was about the size of an apple, with a cartilaginous skin
covered with discs.[1137] Probably it was a fossil echinus, such as has
been found in Gaulish tombs.[1138] Such "eggs" were doubtless connected
with the cult of the serpent, or some old myth of an egg produced by
serpents may have been made use of to account for their formation. This
is the more likely, as rings or beads of glass found in tumuli in Wales,
Cornwall, and the Highlands are called "serpents' glass" (_glain
naidr_), and are believed to be formed in the same way as the "egg."
These, as well as old spindle-whorls called "adder stones" in the
Highlands, are held to have magical virtues, e.g. against the bite of a
serpent, and are highly prized by their owners.[1139]

Pliny speaks also of the Celtic belief in the magical virtues of coral,
either worn as an amulet or taken in powder as a medicine, while it has
been proved that the Celts during a limited period of their history
placed it on weapons and utensils, doubtless as an amulet.[1140] Other
amulets--white marble balls, quartz pebbles, models of the tooth of the
boar, or pieces of amber, have been found buried with the dead.[1141]
Little figures of the boar, the horse, and the bull, with a ring for
suspending them to a necklet, were worn as amulets or images of these
divine animals, and phallic amulets were also worn, perhaps as a
protection against the evil eye.[1142]

A cult of stones was probably connected with the belief in the magical
power of certain stones, like the _Lia Fail_, which shrieked aloud when
Conn knocked against it. His Druids explained that the number of the
shrieks equalled the number of his descendants who should be kings of
Erin.[1143] This is an aetiological myth accounting for the use of this
fetich-stone at coronations. Other stones, probably the object of a cult
or possessing magical virtues, were used at the installation of chiefs,
who stood on them and vowed to follow in the steps of their
predecessors, a pair of feet being carved on the stone to represent
those of the first chief.[1144] Other stones had more musical
virtues--the "conspicuous stone" of Elysium from which arose a hundred
strains, and the melodious stone of Loch Laig. Such beliefs existed into
Christian times. S. Columba's stone altar floated on the waves, and on
it a leper had crossed in the wake of the saint's coracle to Erin. But
the same stone was that