Irish Druids And Old Irish Religions

the left arm is a hunting scene; on the right are chariots, horsemen, and dogs. A human head had a forked, oriental-looking beard.

Lucan mentions that the Druids wrote over the cross, Pan Daran, Lord of Thunder, bearing Hesus or Hu on the right arm, and Beli on the left.

Mrs. Wilkes, in her Ireland the Ur of the Chaldees, has thus declared her views--"The cross as a symbol is traceable to the crossed rods of the Chaldæan Shepherd Kings,--as ancient as the fish and the serpent signs, and as the, ring and cup cuttings to be seen on the stones of Scotland and Ireland." Again, "The inhabitants of Erin, previous to the arrival of St. Patrick, were well acquainted with the cross as a symbol" Further she writes, "As we find the Christian emblem was general among the Druids, no one need fear assigning to many of the crosses of Ireland and Scotland a period far anterior to the introduction of Christianity."

The crann tau-ré, or crois-tau-ré, the Fiery Cross, which was carried through the Highlands thirty miles in three hours, in the year 1745, at the Stuart Rebellion, was known in very remote times among the western Celts, as it still is in India. When dipped in the blood of goats, and bearing a flame, it was the message of alarm among the wild tribes. A serpentine figure was often twisted round the cross in heathen times.

It is curious to find that the pagan crosses of Central India resemble many still existing in Cornwall and Ireland. A St Andrew's cross marked the ancient Holy Cakes Egypt. A Buddhist god bore the cross and trident in his hand. The Emperor Decius had the cross on coins. Some of the early Fathers were led to call the old heathen cross an invention of the devil.

The cross of Finglas has a romantic history. It was

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