The Curiosities of Heraldry Part 18

Michael Drayton bore 'Azure gutte d'eau [the drops of Helicon!] a Pegasus current in bend argent.' _Crest_, 'Mercury's winged cap amidst sunbeams proper.' These cla.s.sical emblems appear foreign to the spirit of heraldry, which originated in an uncla.s.sical age. Still it might have been difficult to a.s.sign to this stately and majestic poet more appropriate armorials.

The supporters chosen by Sir George Gordon, first Lord Aberdeen, a celebrated jurist, were _two lawyers_; while (every man to his taste) Sir William Morgan, K.B., a keen sportsman, adopted _two huntsmen_ equipped for the chase, and the motto 'Saltando cave,' _Look before you leap_.

Could anything be more pitiful?

VII. Arms derived from TENURE and OFFICE are a much more interesting, though less numerous, cla.s.s than the preceding.

"The tenure of the lands of Pennycuik, in Midlothian, obliges the possessor to attend once a year in the forest of Drumsleich (near Edinburgh) ... to give a blast of a horn at the king's hunting; and therefore Clerk of Pennycuik, baronet, the proprietor of these lands, uses the following crest:"[224] 'A demi-forester, habited vert, sounding a hunting-horn proper;' and motto, 'FREE FOR A BLAST.' Most of the English families of Forester, Forster, and Foster have bugle-horns in their arms, supporting the idea that the founders of those families derived their surnames from the office of Forester, held by them in times when the country abounded in woody districts. This office was one of considerable honour and emolument.

The crest of Grosvenor is 'a hound or talbot statant or;' and the supporters 'two talbots reguardant or,' &c. Both these ensigns and the name allude to the antient office of the chiefs of this family, which was that of =Le Gros Veneur=, great huntsman, to the Dukes of Normandy.

Rawdon, earl of Moira, ancestor of the Marquis of Hastings; 'Argent, a fesse between three pheons or arrow-heads sable.' _Crest_, in a mural coronet argent, a pheon sable, with a sprig of laurel issuing therefrom proper. _Supporters_, two huntsmen with bows, quivers, &c. &c. This family were denominated from their estate, Rawdon, near Leeds, co. York, which they originally held under William the Conqueror. A rhyming t.i.tle-deed, purporting to have been granted by him, but evidently of much later date, was formerly in the possession of the family:

"=I William King=, the thurd yere of my reigne, Give to thee, Paulyn Roydon, Hope and Hopetowne, Wyth all the bounds, both up and downe, From Heaven to yerthe, from yerthe to hel; For the and thyn ther to dwell, As truly as this Kyng-right is myn; =For a cross-bowe and an arrow, When I sal come to hunt on Yarrow;= And in token that this thing is sooth, I bit the whyt wax with my tooth."

The family of Pitt, earl of Chatham, bore 'Sable, a fesse _chequy_ argent and azure, between three bezants or pieces of _money_,' in allusion to the office the original grantee held in the EXCHEQUER. The Fanshawes also bore chequy, &c., for the same reason.

The Woods of Largo, co. Fife, bear ships, in allusion to the office of Admiral of Scotland, antiently hereditary in that family.

The antient Earls of Warren and Surrey bore 'chequy, or and azure.' There is a tradition that the heads of this family were invested with the exclusive prerogative of granting licenses for the sale of malt liquors, and that it was enjoined on all alehouse-keepers to paint the Warren arms on their door-posts. Hence the chequers, still seen at the entrances of many taverns, were supposed to have originated, until the discovery of that ornament on an inn-door among the ruins of Pompeii proved the fashion to have existed in cla.s.sical times. Its origin is involved in obscurity; it may have been placed upon houses of entertainment to show that some game a.n.a.logous to the modern chess and backgammon might be played within.

Here we may be allowed to digress, to say a few words on the origin of _inn signs_, which are generally of an heraldric character. In early times the town residences of the n.o.bility and great ecclesiastics were called Inns; and in front of them the family arms were displayed. In many cases these Inns were afterwards appropriated to the purposes of the modern hotel, affording temporary accommodation to all comers.[225] The armorial decorations were retained, and under the name of signs directed the public to these places of rest and refreshment. On calling to mind the signs by which the inns of any particular town are designated, a very great majority of them will be recognized as regular heraldric charges. In addition to the full armorials of great families, as the Gordon Arms, the Pelham Arms, the Dorset Arms, we find such signs as the Golden Lion, Red Lion, White Lion, Black Lion, White Hart, Blue Boar, Golden Cross, Dragon, Swan, Spread Eagle, Dolphin, Rose and Crown, Catherine-Wheel, Cross-Keys, _c.u.m multis aliis_, abundant everywhere. These were originally, in most cases, the properly emblazoned armories of families possessing influence in the locality; and frequently the inns themselves were established by old domestics of such families. But owing to the negligence of mine host, or the unskilfulness of the common painter, who from time to time renovated his sign, the latter often lost much of its heraldric character; the shield and its tinctures were dropped, and the charges only remained; while by a still further departure from the original intention, three black lions, or five spread eagles, were reduced to one. A house in the town of Lewes was formerly known as the "Three Pelicans," the fact of those charges const.i.tuting the arms of Pelham having been lost sight of.

Another is still called "The Cats," and few are aware that the arms of the Dorset family are intended.[226] In villages, innumerable instances occur of signs taken from the arms or crests of existing families, and very commonly the sign is changed as some neighbouring domain pa.s.ses into other hands. There is a kind of patron and client feeling about this--feudality some may be disposed to call it--which a lover of Old England is pleased to contemplate.

VIII. The last species of Historical Arms are those which relate to Memorable Circ.u.mstances and Events which have occurred to the Ancestors of the families who bear them.

Stanley, earl of Derby. _Crest._ 'On a chapeau gules, turned up ermine, an Eagle with wings expanded or, feeding an Infant in a kind of cradle; at its head a sprig of oak all proper.' This is the blazon given in "Historical and Allusive Arms;"[227] but Collins[228] blazons the Eagle as '_preying upon_' the Infant. This crest belonged originally to the family of Lathom or Latham, whose heiress, Isabella, married Sir John Stanley, afterwards Lieutenant of Ireland, Lord of the Isle of Man, and K. G. in the fourteenth century. According to tradition it originated in the following manner: One of the Lathams of Latham, co. Lancaster, having abandoned and exposed an illegitimate son in the nest of an eagle in a wood called Terlestowe Wood, near his castle, afterwards discovered, to his great astonishment, that the 'king of birds,' instead of devouring the helpless infant, had conceived a great liking for him, supplying him with food, and thus preserving his life. Upon witnessing this miraculous circ.u.mstance the cruel parent relented, and, taking home the infant, made him his heir. A 'various reading' of the tale states that Sir Thomas Latham, being dest.i.tute of legal issue, and wishing to adopt an illegitimate son, a proceeding to which his wife would not be likely to become a party, resorted to the _ruse_ of having the infant placed in the eyrie of an eagle, and then, taking his lady into the park, coming, as if by accident, to the place, at the moment when the eagle was hovering over the nest. Help--of course _accidental_--being at hand, the little fellow was rescued from his perilous couch, and presented to the lady, who pressed him to her bosom, and, ignorant of his consanguinity to her lord, joyfully acquiesced in his proposal to make the foundling heir to their estate.

According to Bishop Stanley's 'Historicall Poem touching ye Family of Stanley,' and Vincent's MS. Collection in the College of Arms, the Lord of Latham was "fowerscore" at the time he adopted this infant,

"Swaddled and clad In a mantle of redd:"

--a statement which discredits both versions of the story as given above.

These authorities further inform us that the foundling received the baptismal name of Oskell, and became father of the Isabella Latham who married Sir John Stanley.

In Seacome's 'History of the House of Stanley' there is an account, derived from another branch of the family, which coincides with the second-mentioned, with the important addition that the adopted child was discarded before the death of Sir Thomas Latham. It is further said, that on the adoption Sir Thomas had a.s.sumed for his crest "an Eagle upon wing, turning her head back and looking in a sprightly manner as for something she had lost," and that on the disowning, the Stanleys (one of whom had married the legal heiress to the estate) "either to distinguish or aggrandize themselves, or in contempt and derision, took upon them the Eagle and Child," thus manifesting the variation and the reason of it.

It is scarcely necessary to state, that the Sir Oskell of the legend has no existence in the veritable records of history; and Mr. Ormerod, the learned historian of Cheshire, who is connected by marriage with the family of Latham, thinks the whole story may be "more safely referred to ancestral Northmen, with its scene in the pine-forests of Scandinavia."[229]

The subjoined engraving relates to this legend. It is copied from a cast[230] taken from an oak carving attached to the stall of James Stanley, bishop of Ely, in the collegiate church (now cathedral) of Manchester, of which he was warden. The figures below the trees are a REBUS[231] of masons or stone-cutters, termed, in mediaeval Latin, _Lathomi_; and the castellated gateway they are approaching is that of Latham Hall, the scene of the tradition.

[Ill.u.s.tration]

Trevelyan of Somersetshire, Bart. 'Gules, a horse argent armed or, issuant from the sea in base, party per fesse wavy, azure and of the second.'

This family primarily bore a very different coat: their present armorials were a.s.sumed "on occasion of one of their ancestors swimming on horseback from the rocks called Seven Stones to the Land's End in Cornwall, at the time of an inundation, which is said to have overwhelmed a large tract of land, and severed thereby those rocks from the continent of Cornwall."[232] This story may appear rather improbable, but it should be remembered that some similar disruptions of land from the coast, such as the Goodwin Sands, Selsey Rocks, &c. are authentic matters of history.

Whether the most powerful of the equine race, which are, even under far more favourable circ.u.mstances, "vain things for safety," would be able to outbrave the violence of the sea necessary to produce such a phenomenon, I leave to better hors.e.m.e.n than myself to decide.

The arms of Aubrey de Vere, the great ancestor of the earls of Oxford,[233] in the 12th century, were 'Quarterly, gules and or; in the first quarter a star or mullet of five points or.' "In the year of our Lord 1098," saith Leland,[234] "Corborant, Admiral to Soudan of Perce [so our antiquary was pleased to spell Persia,] was fought with at Antioche, and discomfited by the Christians. The night c.u.mming on yn the chace of this bataile, and waxing dark, the Christianes being four miles from Antioche, G.o.d, willing the saufte [safety] of the Christianes, shewed a white star or molette of five pointes on the Christen host; which to every mannes sighte did lighte and arrest upon the standard of Albry de Vere, there shyning excessively!" The mullet was subsequently used as a badge by his descendants. "The Erle of Oxford's men had a starre with streames booth before and behind on their lyverys."[235]

Thomas Fitz-Gerald, father of John, first earl of Kildare, bore the sobriquet of Nappagh, Simiacus, or the Ape, from the following ludicrous circ.u.mstance. When he was an infant of nine months old, his grandfather and father were both killed in the war waged by them against M'Carthy, an opposing chief. He was then being nursed at Tralee, and his attendants, in the first consternation caused by the news of the disaster, ran out of the house, leaving the child alone in his cradle. A large ape or baboon, kept on the premises, with the natural love of mischief inherent in that mimic tribe, taking advantage of the circ.u.mstance, took him from his resting-place and clambered with him to the roof of the neighbouring abbey, and thence to the top of the steeple. After having carried his n.o.ble charge round the battlements, exhibiting the while various monkey tricks heretofore unknown to nursery-maids, to the no small consternation and amazement of the spectators, he descended with careful foot, _ad terram firmam_, and replaced the child in the cradle. In consequence of this event the earls of Kildare and other n.o.ble branches of this antient line a.s.sumed as a crest, 'An ape proper, girt about the middle and chained or,' and for supporters, two apes. The addition of the _chain_ is singular.

Stuart, of Hartley-Mauduit, co. Hants. 'Argent, a lion rampant gules, debruised by a bend raguly [popularly termed a _ragged staff_] or.' Sir Alexander Stuart, or Steward, knight, an ancestor of this family, in the presence of Charles VI of France, encountered a lion with a sword, which breaking he seized a part of a tree, and with it killed the animal. This so much pleased the king, that he gave him the above as an augmentation to his paternal arms.[236]

Maclellan Lord Kirkcudbright bore as a crest, 'A dexter arm erect, the hand grasping a dagger, with a human head on the point thereof, couped proper,' In the reign of James II, of Scotland, a predatory horde of foreigners, who entered that kingdom from Ireland, committed great ravages in the shire of Galloway; whereupon a royal proclamation was issued ordering their dispersion, and offering, as a reward to the captor or killer of their chieftain, the barony of Bombie. Now it happened that one Maclellan, whose father had been laird of Bombie, (and had been dispossessed of it for some aggressions on a neighbouring n.o.bleman,) was the fortunate person who killed the chieftain; thus singularly regaining his ancestral property. The crest originated in the circ.u.mstance of his having presented to the king the marauder's head fixed upon the point of a sword.

The head is variously blazoned as that of a _Saracen_, _Moor_, or _Gipsey_, and the question might here be started, 'Who were the lawless band that made the inroad referred to?' The terms Moor and Saracen were in early times applied indiscriminately to Mahometans of every nation, but it cannot be supposed that these intruders were followers of the False Prophet, for we have no record of any such having found their way into regions so remote. Neither is it probable that they were the wild or uncivilized Irish, whose manners and language would have been recognized in the south-western angle of Scotland, which is only separated from Ireland by a narrow channel that could be crossed in a few hours. The most probable opinion is that they belonged to that singular race, the _Gipseys_, who first made their appearance in Germany, Italy, Switzerland, and France, between the years 1409 and 1427. Admitting that a tribe of them found their way soon after from the continent into Ireland, it seems exceedingly likely that a detachment of that tribe should have crossed over to Scotland in the reign of James, between 1438 and 1460. As the Gipseys on their first settlement were black, and could be traced to an oriental source, and as they disavowed Christianity, they were very naturally considered as Saracens, by a rule a.n.a.logous to that which makes all the inhabitants of Christendom Franks in the eyes of a Turk. I have made this little digression because this instance of a Gipsey's head is probably unique in British Heraldry, and because the tradition perfectly coincides in point of time with the actual ingress of the Gipseys into this part of Europe.

The crest of the Davenports of Cheshire, a family as numerous, according to the proverb, as 'dogs' tails,' is 'a man's head couped below the shoulders in profile, hair brown, a halter about his neck proper.'

According to the tradition of the family, it originated after a battle between the Yorkists and Lancastrians, in which one of the Davenports, being of the vanquished party, was spared execution by the commander on the opposite side, on the humiliating condition that he and all his posterity should bear this crest.

When Queen Elizabeth made Sir John Hawkins paymaster of the navy in 1590, she gave him a coat of arms appropriate to his profession, and as a crest, in allusion to his _laudable_ concern in the slave trade, 'A demi-negro proper, manacled with a rope,' the very symbol which, more than two hundred years afterwards, was used to stamp infamy on those concerned in it, as well as abhorrence and detestation of the slave trade itself.[237]

It would be a matter of little difficulty to produce a great number of additional instances of armorials allusive to the personal history or office of the original grantee; but let it be mine rather than that of the fatigued reader to cry

='Ohe, jam satis!'=

[Ill.u.s.tration]

CHAPTER X.

Distinctions of Rank and Honour.

Any treatise on Heraldry, whatever its scope or its design, would certainly be deemed defective if it did not embrace this subject. Heraldry consists of two distinct parts, namely, _first_, the knowledge of t.i.tles and dignities, the proper sphere of each, and the ceremonials connected with them; and, _secondly_, the science of blazon, or the rules by which armorial insignia are composed and borne. One treats of honours; the other of the symbols of those honours. The first, though some will refuse to concede it that distinction, is a science; the second partakes the nature of both a science and an _art_. The immediate object of this humble volume is armory or blazon, its history and its philosophy; yet I should scarcely feel justified in pa.s.sing over, in silence, the other branch of heraldry, abounding as it does with 'Curiosities.' It is not, however, my intention to write a dissertation on the orders of n.o.bility, their origin, their privileges, or their dignity; for the general reader, who happens to be uninformed on these points, can readily consult numerous authorities respecting them, while more profound students, should any such deign to read my lucubrations, would scarcely deem what could be said in the course of a short chapter sufficient. I must therefore refer the former cla.s.s to their peerages, or books of elementary heraldry, while the latter will not require that I should point out the learned tomes of Segar, Selden, Markham, and the various other 'workes of honour,' of which our literature has been so remarkably prolific. To relieve the tedium occasioned by the constant reference to or, and gules, and ermine; and bend, and fesse, and cheveron; and lions rampant and eagles displayed, which must necessarily occur in a book of heraldry, even in one which professes to treat of its 'Curiosities,' I intend here, _currente calamo_, to lay before the reader a few jottings which have occurred to me in the course of my heraldric and antiquarian researches.

It has been observed that "among barbarous nations there are no family names. Men are known by _t.i.tles_ of honour, by _t.i.tles_ of disgrace, or by _t.i.tles_ given to them on account of some individual quality. A brave man will be called the lion, a ferocious one the tiger. Others are named after a signal act of their lives, or from some peculiarity of personal appearance; such as the slayer-of-three-bears, the taker-of-so-many-scalps, or straight-limbs, long-nose, and so on. Some of these, especially such as express approbation or esteem, are worn as proudly by their savage owners as that of duke or marquis is by European n.o.bles.[238] They confer a distinction which begets respect and deference amongst the tribes, and individuals so distinguished obtain the places of honour at feasts, and they are the leaders in battle. It is nearly the same in modern civilized life; t.i.tled personages are much sought after and feted by the tribes of unt.i.tled; and are, moreover, the leaders of fashion. The only difference between the savage and civilized t.i.tles of honour is, that in the former case they can only be obtained by deeds; they must be earned; which is not always the case with modern distinctions."

All t.i.tles of honour indubitably originated in official employments, though, in the lapse of ages, they have become, as to the majority, entirely honorary. This will appear on an etymological inquiry into the meaning of the t.i.tles still enjoyed in our social system. Thus, DUKE is equivalent with _dux_, a leader or commander, and such, in a military sense, were those personages who primarily bore this distinction. MARQUIS, according to the best authorities, signifies a military officer to whom the sovereign intrusted the guardianship of the marches or borders of a territory. An EARL or count was the lieutenant or viceroy of a county, and the geographical term owes its origin to the office. A vicecomes, or VISCOUNT, again, was the deputy of a count. The derivation of BARON is more obscure; still there was a period when official duties were required of the holders of the t.i.tle. To descend to the lesser n.o.bility, KNIGHT is synonymous with servant, a servant in a threefold sense, first to religion, next to his sovereign, and thirdly to his 'ladye;' while an ESQUIRE was in antient times _ecuyer_ or _scutifer_, the knight's shield-bearer. Among the Orientals official duties are still attached to every t.i.tle of honour; and it is worthy of remark that the highest of all t.i.tles, that of king, has never, in any country, been merely honorary; the responsible duties of government having always been connected with it.

In sovereigns, whom our old writers quaintly term 'fountains of honour,'

is vested the right of conferring dignities, and it is by a judicious use of this prerogative that the balance of a limited monarchy is properly preserved. Were there no difference of grade amongst the subjects of a state, the monarch would be too far removed from his people, and mutual disgust or indifference would be the consequence. A well-const.i.tuted peerage serves as a connecting link between the sovereign and the great body of his subjects, and may therefore be regarded, next to the loyal affections of the people, the firmest prop of the throne.

I know that, in these utilitarian days, this position is frequently and fiercely controverted, and that probably by many who have never read the following eloquent pa.s.sage of Burke--a pa.s.sage which though _decies repet.i.ta placebit_, and which I therefore introduce without apology:

"To be honoured and even privileged by the laws, opinions, and inveterate usages of our country, growing out of the prejudice of ages, has nothing to provoke horror and indignation in any man. Even to be too tenacious of those privileges is not absolutely a crime. The strong struggle in every individual to preserve possession of what he has found to belong to him, and to distinguish him, is one of the securities against injustice and despotism implanted in our nature. It operates as an instinct to secure property, and to preserve communities in a settled state. What is there to shock in this? n.o.bility is a graceful ornament to the civil order. It is the Corinthian capital of polished society. _Omnes boni n.o.bilitati semper favemus_ was the saying of a wise and good man. It is, indeed, one sign of a liberal and benevolent mind to incline to it with some sort of partial propensity. He feels no enn.o.bling principle in his own heart who wishes to level all the artificial inst.i.tutions which have been adopted for giving a body to opinion and permanence to fugitive esteem. _It is a sour, malignant, and envious disposition, without taste for the reality, or for any image or representation of virtue, that sees with joy the unmerited fall of what had long flourished in splendour and in honour._ I do not like to see anything destroyed, any void produced in society, any ruin on the face of the land."[239]

It is a fact not perhaps generally known that poverty formerly disqualified a peer from holding his dignity. In the reign of Edward IV, George Neville, duke of Bedford, was degraded on this account by Act of Parliament. The reason for this measure is given in the preamble of the Act: "Because it [poverty] causeth great extortion, &c. to the great trouble of all such countries where the estate [of the impoverished lord]

happens to be."[240]

Happily for some of its members, no such prerogative is now exercised by Parliament.

Dignities and t.i.tles, like other things, are of course estimated by their rarity. "If all men were n.o.ble, where would be the n.o.blesse of n.o.bility?"

In no country has so much prudence been displayed in regard to the multiplication of t.i.tles as in England. On the continent, as every one is aware, there is such a profusion of t.i.tled persons that, excepting those of the highest orders, they are very little respected on the score of honour. t.i.tles are so cheap that persons of very indifferent reputation not unfrequently obtain them; and hence the Spanish proverb: "Formerly rogues were hung on crosses, but now crosses are hung upon rogues!" A German potentate once requested to be informed what station an English esquire occupied in the ladder of precedence, and was answered, that he stood somewhat higher than a French count, and somewhat lower than a German prince! There was certainly more truth than courtesy in the reply.

Much has been written on the orders of precedence. I am neither disposed nor qualified to handle so delicate a subject; but the following table, showing how the various grades were formerly recognized by their _hawks_, is so curious that I do not hesitate to introduce it:

"An _eagle_, a _bawter_ (vulture), a _melown_; these belong unto an _emperor_.