By the Rev. E. E. Dor ling. 



115 



plinth between the Lady Chapel and the Chapel of St. Peter, now 

 Occupied by the Grorges monument. The monument is an altar- 

 tomb, decorated with six quatrefoils enclosing shields — one at the 

 east and west, and four on the south side — and bearing the recum- 

 bent effigy of the knight in plate armour of the end of the four- 

 teenth century, with his head resting on a great tilting helmet, 

 bearing the griffin crest of his house. The shield at the east end 

 bears Argent three fusils conjoined in f ess gules, within a bordure sable, 

 the arms of Montacute, with the bordure as the difference of the second 

 son ; that on the west the arms of the Isle of Man — Gules, three 

 human legs in armour, conjoined at the thighs and flexed in triangle 

 proper quartering Montacute (without the bordure) . William, the 

 first earl, was " king " of the Isle of Man, and though in 1392 his 

 eldest son had sold the island, he had reserved to his house the 

 right of quartering these " arms of pretension " with his own, 

 without a difference. On the south side of the monument, 

 counting from the west, are the following shields of arms: — 

 Montacute within a bordure sable (the arms of Sir John) impaling 

 Or, an eagle displayed vert, the arms of Margaret his wife, the heiress 

 of Monthermer. It is noteworthy that in this shield and the next, 

 which is charged with Sir John's arms impaling an uncharged coat, 

 the whole of the bordure, in accordance with ancient custom, is 

 shown ; but the very remarkable third shield bearing Montacute 

 within a bordure engrailed sable quartering the Monthermer eagle is 

 one of which I have been unable to find any satisfactory explanation. 



Apropos of Montacute quartering Monthermer, I should like to 

 remind you of the notable picture by Edwin Abbey, A.R.A., in 

 this year's Academy, representing the wooing of the Lady Anne 

 Neville by Richard, Duke of Gloucester, at the funeral of his victim, 

 Henry VI. Anne Neville was the daughter of Warwick, " the 

 King-maker," who, through his mother, Alice Montacute, was 

 fourth in descent from this Sir John whose monument we are con- 

 sidering, and the painter has marked Anne's descent by blazoning 

 her gorgeous robe with Montacute quartering Monthermer. (She 

 actually bore as the second quarter of her shield, when Queen 

 of Richard III., Montacute impaling Monthermer.) 



