The Idaho Springs siftings-news., 1912-07-20
STILL SEEK TREASURE
PEOPLE OF SCOTCH HIGHLANDS
FIRM IN FAITH.
Tradition Of Buried Wealth lineers
and Is Occasionally Made Stronger
by Finds-Some Heavy Gold
Ornaments Unearthed.

For centuries the search for ancient
treasure has been pursued in the glens
and wild places OF the highlands OF
Scotland, and sometimes unexpected
finds" have been made, writes the
duke of Argyll in Youths Companion.
For instance, a tradition that a treas
ure was hidden at Inyerary had long
been handed down. According TO the
legend, it would never be found except
by stranger Generation after gen
GRAFTON of children searched for it. II
a badger made a hole in the hillside
the children believed that the bad
ger had the scent, and dug up his bur
row; but no young or old badger ever
came forth with bangles on its neck
or its nose. The children watched
every rabbit scrape or hen scrape 10
see If animal or bird had been at
tracted by anything shining under the
sod or in the sand.
Then drainage was introduced. For
merly the glen was too wet to be cul-
tivated, except on dry slopes where
water could not gather, and a hand
plow did all the necessary furrowing
But now red tiled pipes We're put down
to drain off water from fatter ground,
and it was possible to sow in com.
paratively level places.
One pretty piece of grass land un-
der cliff was pointed out as a good
bit for plowing. From the precipice
above a great rock had fallen in long
past ages. This had to be removed.
The man at the plow tail was
stranger, an Englishman.
He put a bag Of powder under the
rock to blow it up. The explosion
followed, the partly splintered rock
heaved and fell on its side. Under
of the lost treasure! There were three
bautiful, heavy gold bracelets, two OF
which had cups at their ends. The
treasure had been found, and by a
stranger" as prophesied.
Those bracelets were beautifully
wrought; one of them had plain ends
where the wrist was slipped through.
AS for the pair with the hollow cups,
an old tradition was recalled which
declared that no person who had com
mitted fault could be forgiven unless
the cups Of gold at the gap in the
bracelets We're filled with his peniten-
tial tears. There is just room for the
nose. like the wrist to slip in between
the golden ends, and it is possible to
hold the cups under the two eyes.
Sometimes ignorant men who have
found such bracelets have looked on
the gold as mere brass. In one case
number OF bracelets found in an
island Of the Hebrides were used as
drawer handles for an old pine chest
of drawers. A peddler came to the
cottage. found that the old chest had
very heavy handles, and gave Is shil.
lings. OF 1915, for it. He took it
away and sold the old handles for
EGO each.
Such heavy ornaments as the brace.
lets must have been a burden to q
Celtic beauty. For a warrior the gold
was beaten out until 1t was thin, for
then 1t was more portable and easily
worked. Patterns OF all kinds could
be punched in 1t, SO as to give a good
effect in front. We can imagine how
grand an old chief rom Brittany or
Wales or Ireland looked with a shin.
ing yellow band on his conical helmet,
broad plate of gold on his right
shoulder and on his left long yellow
mantle gfrt in by the belt itself.