The first notice of a Royal Menagerie in England places this establishment at Woodstock, where King Henry the First had a collection of lions, leopards, and other strange beasts. Three leopards were presented to Henry the Third by the Emperor Frederic the Second, himself a zoologist of no mean rank. From Woodstock[xiv] they were transferred to the Tower; and numerous orders issued in this and the succeeding reigns to the sheriffs of London and of the counties of Bedford and Buckingham to provide for the maintenance of the animals and their keepers are extant among the Records. Thus in the year 1252 the sheriffs of London were commanded to pay four pence a day for the maintenance of a white bear; and in the following year to provide a muzzle and chain to hold the said bear while fishing, or washing himself, in the river Thames. In 1255 they were directed to build a house in the Tower for an elephant which had been presented to the king by Louis king of France; and a second writ occurs in which they were ordere