About the year 1820 a singular object was found in a morass on the farm of Torrs, in the parish of Kelton, Kirkcudbrightshire. Having passed into the possession of Mr. Joseph Train, it was presented by him to Sir Walter Scott, and it still remains in the Museum at Abbotsford.[55] It is of the form of an elongated mask (Fig. 92), somewhat resembling the frontal of a horse. It measures 10½ inches in total length, but the tip is apparently imperfect. Its breadth in a straight line across the lower margin is 3⅝ inches, and about 8½ inches on the round outside. Its greatest breadth in a straight line across the back is 6 inches, and 11 inches on the round outside, immediately above the insertion of the horns. At a height of 3 inches above the lower straight margin are placed two circular holes, one on each side, each measuring 2 inches in diameter. From between these eyelike holes, and a little above the level of their centres, two curiously curved, cylindrical, tapering horns spring close together on either side of the median line. The diameter of each of the horns at the base is 1⅜ inch, and they rise to a height of 8¾ inches to the top of the curve, the whole length of the perfect horns along the curve of the outer edge being 16½ inches. The horns are hollow, the whole object being formed of thin beaten bronze.
This and many of the other objects referred to in this Lecture have been described in the _Proceedings_ of the Society of Antiquaries of Scotland by Dr. John Alexander Smith, who has specially illustrated the interesting relics which I regard as belonging to the closing period of Scotland’s Paganism. They have been referred by Mr. Franks and others to a special school of art which they have denominated the “Late Celtic,” but from my point of view I must regard them as the work of the early Celtic school, which was the precursor and parent of the greater school of Celtic art of the Christian time which I have already described.
[Illustration: Fig. 92.—Bronze object found at Torrs, Kirkcudbrightshire (10½ inches in length).]
Its ornamentation is as peculiar as its form. It consists of a series of irregularly divergent spirals in _repoussé_ work repeated symmetrically but not identically on either side of the median line of the front of the object. These spirals or scroll-like figures are formed of curves which are long and flattened, passing suddenly into curves of quicker motion, and ending in volutes. These curves, though proceeding in the same direction, do not proceed at parallel or regular distances from each other, but converge and diverge so as to enclose between them alternate spaces of varying extent of surface. The spaces enclosed between the curves are raised, and the spaces enclosed by their convolutions are flat, but the raised spaces are modelled so as to express the confluence of solid curves of the peculiar forms already indicated. These trumpet and spiral scrolls, as they are called, enclosing irregularly formed curvilinear spaces, and producing designs which are similar but unsymmetrical, are repeated in different varieties of pattern on the outer sides of the horns (Fig. 93). In the terminal convolutions of the scrolls the curves are sometimes arranged so as to produce a zoomorphic effect, which differs from the later zoomorphism of the metal-work of the Christian time and of the later manuscripts, in being more geometrical in form and character. The zoomorphic termination of the horns has also more of a geometric character than is usual in the Christian period.