rounding surface, and possibly thus marked the traces of the nearly levelled tumulus. Slight as this elevation was, it had proved sufficient to prevent the lodgment of water, and hence the cist was found perfectly free from damp. Within this a male skeleton lay on its left side. The arms appeared to have been folded over the breast, and the knees drawn up so as to touch the elbows. The head had been supported by a flat waterworn stone for its pillow; but from this it had fallen to the bottom of the cist, on its becoming detached by the decomposition of the fleshly ligatures; and, as is common in crania discovered under similar circumstances, it had completely decayed at the part in contact with the ground. A portion of the left side is thus wanting; but with this exception the skull was not only nearly perfect when found, but the bones are solid and heavy ; and the whole skeleton appeared to me so well preserved as to have admitted of articulation. From the view of the skull engraved in the Crania Britannica, it appears to have been somewhat mutilated since I last examined it. Alongside of the head of the deceased, above the right shoulder, probably with food or drink. a neat earthen vase had been placed, It contained only a little sand and black dust when recovered, uninjured, from the spot where it had been deposited by affectionate hands long centuries before, and is now preserved along with the skull in the Scottish Museum. Notwithstanding the hundreds of barrows that have been opened, it is rare indeed to witness an example of the skeleton in situ, so entirely undisturbed as this was. Even where the cist has only been invaded by a partial infiltration of earth or sand, its removal necessitates the displacement of the bones; and when the skeleton has to be exhumed, as is more frequently the case, from the incovering soil, any attempt to represent its actual position must depend to a great extent on the imagination of the artist. Some of such representations, indeed, partake not a little of fancy sketches. Hence the example here described is peculiarly valuable on account of its faithfully revealing to the eye the undisturbed remains of the ancient North Briton, as they had lain since the fleshly tissues decayed and left the naked skeleton to its long repose. I have accordingly reproduced, on Plate III. a drawing of the Juniper Green cist, from a sketch taken at the time, before a single bone had been displaced. It exhibits the interior of the cist as it appeared on the removal of the covering slab, and suffices to show how far any posthu |