ancient military weapon. Axes formed a principal part of the offensive arms of the Celts. At the siege of the Capitol by the Gauls under Brennus, one of the most distinguished of their warriors was armed with a battle-axe; and Ammianus Marcellinus, many centuries afterwards, describing a body of Gauls, states that all of them were armed with battle-axes and swords. Some of these weapons have been found in the sepulchres of the ancient Britons on the downs of Wiltshire and in the north of Scotland. Four or five centuries ago the Irish went constantly armed with axes. At the battle of Bannock- burn, King Robert Bruce cleft an English champion to the chine with one blow of his battle-axe. The Lochaber axe also remained long a formidable weapon in the hands of the Scottish Highlanders; and it constituted the principal arm of the city guard of Edinburgh till the year 1817, when that body of military conservators of the peace was abolished.