_Of the land of Bactry, and of many Griffons and other beastes._
FROM this land men shal go unto the land of Bactry,[1] where are many
wicked men & fell,[2] in that land are trees that beare wol,[3] as
it were shepe, of which they make cloth. In this land are ypotains[4]
that dwel sometime on land, sometime on water, and are halfe a man and
halfe a horse, and they eate not but men, when they may get them. In
this land are many gryffons, more than in other places, and some say
they haue the body before as an Egle, and behinde as a Lyon, and it is
trouth, for they be made so; but the Griffen hath a body greater than
viii Lyons and stall worthier[5] than a hundred Egles. For certainly
he wyl beare to his nest flying, a horse and a man upon his back, or
two Oxen yoked togither as they go at plowgh, for he hath longe nayles
on hys fete, as great as it were hornes of Oxen,[6] and of those they
make cups there to drynke of, and of his rybes[7] they make bowes to
shoote with.
[Footnote 1: Bactria.]
[Footnote 2: Crafty.]
[Footnote 3: Wool.]
[Footnote 4: Hippopotamuses.]
[Footnote 5: Stouter, braver.]
[Footnote 6: The editor of the edition of 1827 says, in a
footnote, p. 325: "One 4 foot long, in the Cotton Library,
has a Silver Hoop about the end, whereon is engraven _Griphi
Unguis, Divo Cuthberto Dunelmensi sacer_. Another, about an
Ell long, is mentioned by _Dr. Greis_, in his History of the
Rarities of the Royal Society, p. 26; tho' the Doctor there
supposes it rather the horn of a Rock Buck, or of the _Ibex
mas_." Such was science a little over fifty years since!]
[Footnote 7: Ribs.]