The Chinese seals of Ireland.
Not the things with the big, wistful eyes that lie on ice, and that are
taught to balance objects on their noses--but inscribed stamps, with
which to make impressions.
_Proc. Roy. Irish Acad._, 1-381:
A paper was read by Mr. J. Huband Smith, descriptive of about a dozen
Chinese seals that had been found in Ireland. They are all alike: each a
cube with an animal seated upon it. "It is said that the inscriptions
upon them are of a very ancient class of Chinese characters."
The three points that have made a leper and an outcast of this
datum--but only in the sense of disregard, because nowhere that I know
of is it questioned:
Agreement among archaeologists that there were no relations, in the
remote past, between China and Ireland:
That no other objects, from ancient China--virtually, I suppose--have
ever been found in Ireland:
The great distances at which these seals have been found apart.
After Mr. Smith's investigations--if he did investigate, or do more than
record--many more Chinese seals were found in Ireland, and, with one
exception, only in Ireland. In 1852, about 60 had been found. Of all
archaeologic finds in Ireland, "none is enveloped in greater mystery."
(_Chambers' Journal_, 16-364.) According to the writer in _Chambers'
Journal_, one of these seals was found in a curiosity shop in London.
When questioned, the shopkeeper said that it had come from Ireland.
In this instance, if you don't take instinctively to our expression,
there is no orthodox explanation for your preference. It is the
astonishing scattering of them, over field and forest, that has hushed
the explainers. In the _Proceedings of the Royal Irish Academy_, 10-171,
Dr. Frazer says that they "appear to have been sown broadcast over the
country in some strange way that I cannot offer solution of."
The struggle for expression of a notion that did not belong to Dr.
Frazer's era:
"The invariable story of their find is what we might expect if they had
been accidentally dropped...."
Three were found in Tipperary; six in Cork; three in Down; four in
Waterford; all the rest--one or two to a county.
But one of these Chinese seals was found in the bed of the River Boyne,
near Clonard, Meath, when workmen were raising gravel.
That one, at least, had been dropped there.
12
Astronomy.
And a watchman looking at half a dozen lanterns, where a street's been
torn up.
There are gas lights and kerosene lamps and electric lights in the
neighborhood: matches flaring, fires in stoves, bonfires, house afire
somewhere; lights of automobiles, illuminated signs--
The watchman and his one little system.
Ethics.
And some young ladies and the dear old professor of a very "select"
seminary.