Spain.

[165] _Shells_.--Cat. Ant. R.I.A.; Stone Mat. p. 180. The ethnographic
phases of conchology might form a study in itself. Shells appear to be
the earliest form of ornament in use. The North American Indians have
their shell necklaces buried with them also. See Wilson's _Pre-Historic
Man_.

[166] _Child_.--Mr. Wilson gives a most interesting description of an
interment of a mother and child in an ancient Peruvian grave. The mother
had an unfinished piece of weaving beside her, with its colours still
bright. The infant was tenderly wrapped in soft black woollen cloth, to
which was fastened a pair of little sandals, 2-1/2 inches long; around
its neck was a green cord, attached to a small shell.--_Pre-Historic
Man_, vol. i. p. 234.

[167] _Clare_.--In 1855, in digging for a railway-cutting in the county
Clare, gold ornaments were found worth L2,000 as bullion.

[168] _Carbuncle_.--This word was used to denote any shining stone of a
red colour, such as garnet, a production of the country.

CHAPTER XI.

Pestilence of the _Blefed_--The Cursing of Tara by St. Rodanus--Extent
and Importance of Ancient Tara--The First Mill in Ireland--The _Lia
Fail_--Cormac's House--The Rath of the Synods--The Banqueting
Hall--Chariots and Swords--St. Columba--St. Brendan and his
Voyages--Pre-Columbian Discovery of America--The Plague again--St.
Columba and St. Columbanus--Irish Saints and Irish Schools--Aengus the
Culdee.

[A.D. 543-693.]

From time to time, in the world's history, terrible and mysterious
pestilences appear, which defy all calculation as to their cause or
probable reappearance. Such was the _Blefed_,[169] or _Crom Chonaill_,
which desolated Ireland in the year 543.

The plague, whatever its nature may have been, appears to have been
general throughout Europe. It originated in the East; and in Ireland was
preceded by famine, and followed by leprosy. St. Berchan of Glasnevin
and St. Finnen of Clonard were amongst its first victims.

Diarmaid, son of Fergus Keval, of the southern Hy-Nial race, was
Ard-Righ during this period. In his reign Tara was cursed by St. Rodanus
of Lothra, in Tipperary, in punishment for violation of sanctuary;[170]
and so complete was its subsequent desertion, that in 975 it was
described as a desert overgrown with grass and weeds.

But enough still remains to give ample evidence of its former
magnificence. An inspection of the site must convince the beholder of
the vast exte