“Thou of the silver bow, god of Claros, hear!”
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I never had any objection to the doctrine which made of you, the brilliant personification of the sun, a first class divinity; but I think like honors ought to have been bestowed upon the unknown man who first invented windows and window-panes, the first glazier in fine. He ought at least to have been made a demigod, and if he had to remain a simple mortal, they ought surely to have remembered his name! Alas! that high honors are as unfairly distributed in heaven as upon earth!
As there is no window, I peep through the trapdoor to see how these subterranean dwellings look inside. The aspect is far from being as wretched as I had expected. I find that the walls are hung with mattings and the floor is beaten hard; by the side of the smoking lamp which is suspended from the main beam of the ceiling, there are hanging, on hooks, a hindquarter of venison, baskets filled with provisions, and implements for fishing and hunting. Besides, I notice long strings of medicinal herbs, such as we see in the shops of herb-doctors, and among these plants the mistletoe occupies, as a matter of course, the place of honor.
In another underground hut there appear actually some traces of luxury. Here the walls are incrusted with pebbles from the Rhine, of many colors and skillfully arranged; here and there weapons are arranged in various shapes; javelins with sharp hooks; framees, such as the ancient Franks were using; hatchets of stone or iron; “morning stars,” with sharp points, were pleasantly mingled with huge bucklers; large leather quivers and long arrows feathered at one end and with jagged teeth at the other. At first sight it looks as if for the purpose of softening somewhat the threatening aspect of these panoplies, the Celtic lady of the house had added some of her jewels to these weapons. But it is not so; these gold chains, these necklaces set with onyx and rubies, are worn by the grim warriors on the day of battle, quite as much in the nature of ornaments as for the purpose of protection. One of our sober, I may say, most sober historians, ascribes to this custom of our forefathers, the Franks, the gorget, worn still by officers in some European armies. Here also I see straw mats, but here they are trod under foot; they are used as carpets, not as hangings.
The deep and spacious dwelling contains, besides the large room which alone I can see through my dormer-window, a number of other rooms on all sides, or rather of other caves, which are all connected with each other. I am evidently before the palace of one of the chief men of the country.
In the first hut, into which I had looked, I had found the people at table, drinking a beverage made from grain and herbs—cerevisia—in horns of wild bulls, and talking about business—for our ancestors talked about business at dinner, just as we do. The conversation turned about exchanges of rams, a great fishing expedition to be undertaken jointly, an invasion to be made into the territory on the other