Minor Queries.
68. _Heraldic Figures at Tonbridge Castle._--In the court of the castle
of this place, there stands a colossal figure of what I take to be an
heraldic panther gorged with a ducal crown, supporting a shield of the
royal arms of France and England quarterly, as borne before the
accession of James I.
The corresponding supporter is gone, but the base and one claw remain,
showing it to have been a beast of prey, and with it is a broken shield,
thereon, "party per pale three lions rampant;" the arms, and probably
the supporter of the Herberts, earls of Pembroke. The two figures have
evidently capped the piers of a gateway.
Can any of your readers account for the presence of these figures here,
where the Herberts are not recorded to have possessed any property?