Note 4 — Chapter XVIII · SACRED PLACES AND OBJECTS
Reading edition
It seems to me probable that the present sanctity of the bell has come about by a process of transference4 from the buffalo to the object worn by it. Probably at one time the buffaloes were more directly venerated than they appear to be at present. There is evidence that even in recent times the bell-cow or buffalo which carried the bell was an object of especial veneration. In such books as those of Harkness and Marshall, the bell-cow seems to occupy a more prominent position than, so far as I could tell, it occupies at present.