"The _Shăn Kiao_ belongs to the _Kiao_ species, and also has the appearance of a snake. It has horns like a dragon; the mane is red below the waist; all the scales are projecting. It eats swallows, and can emit an air which appears like a tower. "Again, any turtle when old enough may be called a _Shăn_." LONDON: PRINTED BY W. H. ALLEN AND CO., 13 WATERLOO PLACE. S.W. FOOTNOTES: [1] This tributary offering is a common feature in dragon legends. A good example is that given by El Edrisi in his history of the dragon destroyed by Alexander the Great in the island of Mostachin (one of the Canaries?). [2] The latest writer on this point summarizes his views, in his opening remarks, as follows:--"The science of heraldry has faithfully preserved to modern times various phases of some of those remarkable legends which, based upon a study of natural phenomena, exhibit the process whereby the greater part of mythology has come into existence. Thus we find the solar gryphon, the solar phœnix, a demi-eagle displayed issuing from flames of fire; the solar lion and the lunar unicorn, which two latter noble creatures now harmoniously support the royal arms. I propose in the following pages to examine the myth of the unicorn, the wild, white, fierce, chaste, moon, whose two horns, unlike those of mortal creatures, are indissolubly twisted into one; the creature that endlessly fights with the lion to gain the crown or summit of heaven, which neither may retain, and whose brilliant horn drives away the darkness and evil of the night even as we find in the myth, that Venym is defended by the horn of the unicorn."--_The Unicorn; a Mythological Investigation._ Robert Brown, jun., F.S.A. London, 1881. [3] "The midgard or world-serpent we have already become tolerably well acquainted with, and recognise in him the wild tumultuous sea. Thor contended with him; he got him on his hook, but did not succeed in killing him. We also remember how Thor tried to lift him in the form of a cat. The North abounds in stories about the sea-serpent, which are nothing but variations of the original myths of the Eddas. Odin cast him into the sea, where he shall remain until he is conquered by Thor in Ragnarok."--_Norse Mythology_, p. 387. R. B. Anderson, Chicago, 1879. [4] _Vide_ Anderson. [5] Just as even the greatest masters of fiction adapt but do not originate. Harold Skimpole and Wilkins Micawber sat unconsciously for their portraits in real life, and the most charming characters and fertile plots produced by that most prolific of all writers, A. Dumas, are mere elaborations of people and incidents with which historical memoirs provided him.