Edmond, Earl of Lancaster, was succeeded by his son Thomas, who in the
fifteenth year of the reign of Edward II. was attainted of high treason. In
the first of Edward III. his attainder was reversed, and his son Henry
inherited his titles, and subsequently was created Duke of Lancaster.
Blanche, daughter of Henry, first Duke of Lancaster, subsequently became
his heir, and was second wife to John of Gaunt, and mother to Henry IV.

Edward IV.'s claim to the throne was by descent from Lionel, Duke of
Clarence, third son of Edward III., his mother being Cicely, youngest
daughter of Ralph Neville, Earl of Westmoreland. Lionel married Elizabeth
de Burgh, an Irish heiress, who died shortly after, leaving one daughter,
Philippa. As William of Hatfield, second son of Edward III., died at an
early age, without issue, according to all our ideas of hereditary
succession Philippa, only child of Edward III.'s third son, ought to have
inherited before the son of his fourth son; and Sir Edward Coke expressly
declares, that the right of the crown was in the descent from Philippa,
daughter and heir of Lionel, Duke of Clarence. Henry IV.'s right, however,
was incontestable, being based on overwhelming might. Philippa married
Edward Mortimer, Earl of March. Roger, their son, succeeded his father in
his titles, and left one daughter, Anne, who married Richard, Earl of
Cambridge, son of Edmund Langley, Duke of York, which Edmund, Duke of York,
was the fifth son of Edward III.; and thus the line of York, though a
younger branch of the royal family, took precedence, _de jure_, of the
Lancaster line. From this union sprang Richard, Duke of York, who was
killed under the walls of Sandal Castle, and who left his titles and
pretensions to Edward, afterwards the fourth king of that name.

The above is taken from several authorities, among which are Blackstone's
_Comm._, book i. ch. iii.; and Miss Strickland's _Lives of the Queens of
England_, vols. ii. iii. iv.

TEE BEE.

* * * * *

FOSSIL ELK OF IRELAND.

(Vol. ii., p. 494.; Vol. iii., p. 26.)

W. R. C. states that he is anxious to collect all possible information as
to this once noble animal. I would have offered the following notes and
references sooner, but that I was confident that some abler contributor to
the pages of "NOTES AND QUERIES" would have brought out of his stores much
to interest your natural history readers (whose Queries I regret are so few