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Striking off on the right, they came to a spot covered over with immense grey stones, resembling those rocky fragments used by the Druids in the construction of a cromlech, and, as it was quite dark, it required some caution in passing through them. Guided by the keeper, who here took hold of the bridle of his horse, Leonard threaded the pass with safety; but Blaize was not equally fortunate.
The Doctor struck his foot against a long grey stone, half hidden in the grass, and only just saved himself from falling. "Remains of some old cromlech," explained the Doctor. "Somewhere about here, if we were to dig down, we should find a withered bundle of bones crouching over the dust of a prehistoric luncheon-basket. Interesting neighbourhood!" The descent was rough.
They had an exhilarating drive through the mountains to Tre'r Caeri, a British fastness on a stern bare height; crumbled dwellings amid their great protecting walls, with cairn and cromlech and mystic circles; where in old time the noise of battle clanged amid these grey hills, now sleeping in sunlight.
From the same point, the Pillars of Hercules, begins our second or northern cromlech region, even larger and more extensive than the first, though hardly richer in titanic memorials. From Gibraltar, the cromlech region passes northward, covering Portugal and western Spain; indeed, it probably merges in the other province to the eastward, the two including all Spain between them.
The masonry is of different character from that cyclopean piling of boulders which was all the earlier men had known of building. Of such cyclopean style, though it is a small specimen, is the Chûn cromlech, standing near.
Farther along the shore, where Bundoran marks the boundary of Donegal, a cromlech and a stone circle rise among the sand-banks. All have the same rugged and enduring massiveness, all are wrapped in the same mystery. Eastward from Sligo, Lough Gill lies like a mirror framed in hills, wreathed with dark green woods.
At the northern door of this gallery are, a painting of Stonehenge, and one of the cromlech at Plâs Newydd, in Anglesea. The visitor's way now lies to the west out of the eastern zoological gallery into the most southerly of the two northern galleries. This gallery, which consists of five compartments, or rooms, is called
These sacred circles were generally situated near some stream, or under the shadow of a grove or wide-spreading oak. In the centre of the circle stood the Cromlech or altar, which was a large stone, placed in the manner of a table upon other stones set up on end. The Druids had also their high places, which were large stones or piles of stones on the summits of hills.
The spectacle thus presented was a vast portal in the midst of the sea. It might have been a titanic cromlech planted there in mid-ocean by hands accustomed to proportion their labours to the great deep. Its wild outline stood well defined against the clear sky when Gilliatt approached in his sloop. The rocks, thus holding fast and exhibiting their prey, were terrible to behold.
They are frequently of considerable size. The cromlech is opened by removing one of the heavy stone slabs in front.
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