_A living Dog better than a dead Lion._--Your correspondent "MR. JOHN
SANSOM" may, perhaps, accept the following as an answer to the first
part of his Query (No. 22. p. 352.). In an ancient MS. preserved in the
archives of the see of Ossory, at fol. 66., is entered, in a hand of the
latter part of the fourteenth century, a list of ancient proverbs under
the following heading:-- {405}
"Eux sount les proverbes en fraunceys conferme par auctorite del
_Dibil_?
"Chers amys receiuez de moy
Un beau present q vo' envoy,
Non pas dor ne dargent
Mais de bon enseignment,
Que en escriptur ai trove
E de latin translatee, &c. &c."