ic tribe. It is of coarse granite, 6 ft. 3 in. high, 2 ft. 9 in.
broad, and from 7 to 9 inches thick. It bears an Ogam inscription on
two angles of the same face, and debased Roman characters on the front
and back. It reads, according to Mr. Brash, in the Ogam, "Safagguc the
son of Cuic;" and, in the Roman, "Fanon the son of Rian."

The three Irish Ogam stones were presented to the British Museum by
Colonel A. Lane Fox, F.S.A., who dug them out of an ancient fort at
Roovesmore, near Kilcrea, on the Cork Railway, where they were
forming the roof of a subterranean chamber. No. 1 cannot be positively
deciphered or translated; No. 2 is inscribed to "the son of Falaman,"
who lived in the eighth century, and also to "the son of Erca," one of
a family of Kings and Bishops who flourished in the ancient kingdom
of Ireland; and No. 3, which is damaged, is supposed to have been
dedicated to a Bishop Usaille, about A.D. 454. All the stones came
probably from some cemetery in the district in which they were found.

It has been remarked that the distribution of these old stones marks
clearly the ancient history of our islands; their frequency or rarity
in each case corresponding accurately with the relations existing in
remote times between Ireland on the one side, and Wales, Cornwall, and
Scotland on the other. Further enquiry into the subject is scarcely to
be expected in this rudimentary work.

To seek for the germ of the gravestone is indeed a far quest. Like the
_ignis fatuus_, it recedes as we seem to approach it. In the sculpture
galleries of the British Museum there are several examples preserved
to us from the ancient Empire of Assyria, and one described as the
"Monolith of Shahnaneser II., King of Assyria, B.C. 850," is almost
the exact counterpart of the headstones which are in vogue to-day. It
stands 5 ft. 6 in. high, is 2 ft. 9 in. wide, and 8 inches thick. Like
the Scottish stones of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries it is
inscribed on both faces.

CHAPTER XIV.

THE REGULATION OF GRAVESTONES.

It has been already pointed out, and is probably well known, that the
clergyman of the parish church has possessed from immemorial time the
prerogative of refusing to allow in the churchyard under his control
any monument, gravestone, design, or epitaph which is, in his opinion,
irreverent, indecorous, or in any way unbecoming the solemnity and
sanctity of the place. This authority, wherever exercised, has
bee