a dedication which, I must confess, puzzles me sorely. A griffin's claw and the 'saint-bishop' of Durham seem as absurd a combination of ideas as that presented in the old proverbial phrase of 'Great A and a Bull's Foot,' or by the tavern sign of 'The Goat and Compasses.' If wisdom, according to classical authority, lies in a well, so does the wit of this association. Another griffin's claw, curiously mounted on an eagle's leg of silver, which came at the Revolution from the Treasury at St. Denis, is preserved in the cabinet of antiquities in the King's Library at Paris. Three such talons were formerly kept at Bayeux, and were fastened on high days to the altar as precious relics! A 'corne de griffoun' is mentioned in the Kalend. of Excheq. iii, 176. Another, about an ell in length, is mentioned by Dr. Grew in his 'History of the Rarities of the Royal Society,' p. 26. The Doctor thinks it the horn of a roebuck, or of the _Ibex mas_. Leigh says that griffyns "are of a great hugenes, for I have a clawe of one of their pawes, which should show them to be as bygge as _two_ lyons." The egg was likewise preserved as a valuable curiosity, and used as a goblet. "Item, j oef de griffon, garnis d'argent, od pie et covercle." The griffin was assumed by the family of Le Dispenser, and the upper part appears as the crest on the helm of Hugh le Dispenser, who was buried at Tewkesbury in 1349. Another strikingly designed representation of this curious animal is seen at Warwick, at the feet of Richard Beauchamp, who died in 1439.[132] The _harpy_, unusual in English armory, has the head and breasts of a woman, with the body, legs, and wings of a vulture. This was a classical monster. Guillim, imitating Virgil,[133] says: "Of monsters all, most monstrous this; no greater wrath God sends 'mongst men; it comes from depths of pitchy hell; And virgin's face, but wombe like gulfe insatiate hath; Her hands are griping clawes, her colour pale and fell." The coat 'Azure, a harpy or,' was 'in Huntingdon church' in Guillim's time. The _lyon-dragon_ and the _lyon-poisson_ are compound monsters; the former of a lion and a dragon, and the latter of a lion and a fish. These are of very rare occurrence, as is also the _monk-fish_, or Sea Friar, which Randle Holme tells us 'is a fish in form of a frier.' 'Such a monstrous and wonderful fish,' he adds, 'was taken in Norway.' The identity of the popular idea of the _mermaid_ with the classical notion of the syren is shown in the following passage from Shakspeare: "Thou rememberest Since once I sat upon a promontory, And heard a Mermaid on a dolphin's back Uttering such dulcet and harmonious breath, That the rude sea grew civil at her song."