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246
OMNIANA.

till he has turned all the fingers inside out. In those countries where the peasants are liable to frequent rencontres with these animals, it would certainly be good policy always to perform the ceremony of throwing the glove before the combat. Against this beast, who is fond of coming to close quarters, a good hint might be borrowed from the ballad of the Dragon of Wantley. Bruin's hug would prove fatal to himself, if at the moment when he would else be victorious, he should embrace a Moore-of-Moore-hall jerkin.

The ancients had a strange fable concerning the lion, which Archbishop Abbot repeats with full belief in his Brief Description of the World. "Aramianus Marcellinus, (he says,) reporteth one thing of Chaldea, wherein the admirable power of God doth appear; for he writeth, that in those parts are a huge number of lions, which were like enough to devour up both men and beasts