The Egyptians revere the beetle as a living and breathing image of the sun, quoth Porphyry.[5] That will account for this restless delver's extraordinary talismanic renown. I think the lady-bird is "the speckled beetle" which was flung in hot water to avert storms.[6] Pignorius gives us the figure of the beetle, crowned with the sun, and encircled with the serpent of eternity; while another, an onyx in the collection of Abraham Gorlæus, threatens to gnaw at a thunderbolt.[7]
Reuven's book on the Egyptian Museum, which I have not seen, notices an invocation to "the winged beetle, the monarch ([Greek: tyrannos]) of mid-heaven," concluding with a devout wish that some poor creature "may be dashed to pieces."
Can any of your readers inform me what is meant by "the blood of the Phuôn?"
Yours truly,
?
St. Martin's, Guernsey, Jan. 9. 1850.
EXTRACTS FROM CHURCHWARDENS' ACCOUNTS OF ST. MARGARET'S, WESTMINSTER—WEIGHT OF BELLS IN ANCIENT TIMES—HISTORY OF A ROOD-LOFT.
I send you a few Notes, collected out of the Churchwardens' Accounts of St. Margaret's, Westminster.