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1654. We quote the following passage of the conclusion of the treatise of "coot armuris," as a sufficient specimen of the meaning of the Princess in the work she had undertaken.

"Now certainly of all the signys the wich are founde in armys, as of flouris, leafs, and other maruellys tokenys, I can not declare here: ther be so mony. Bot ye shall knaw generally that for all harmys the wich lyghtly any man has seen in his days ye have rules sufficient, as I believe, to dyscerne and blese any of theym; and it be so that ye be not in youre mynde to hesty or to swyfte in the dyscerning. Nor ye may not overryn swiftly the foresayd rules, bot diligently have them in youre mynde, and be not too full of consaitis. For he that will hunt ij haris, i von owre; or von while von, an other while an other, lightly belongs both. Therefore take heede to the rules. If so be that they be not a generall doctrine: yet shall thai profute for this sciens gretly." Here, then, was a full disclosure of all the " mysteries of the gentle craft," of "coat armuris," but made, it must be observed, by a lady of high temporal rank, of the noble blood of the Barons Berners, and of high spiritual rank as Prioress so that we may be sure nothing was intended by the disclosure to injure the existing estimation of rank.

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Gerard Leigh, who followed the Prioress at an interval of nearly a century, with his "Accedence of Armorie," retains the same high tone which she employed in speaking of the birth and the bearers of arms. As the work is very scarce, a quotation may not be unacceptable; it is from his Preface, addressed" to the honourable assemblie of gentlemen in the Innes of Court and Chancerie." He says to them," most humblie I beseech your honors to daine to be patrons of this my worke, against the middle finger pointings of the ungentiles, dissevered into three unequal parts. The first whereof are gentile ungentile. Such be they as will rather shewe armes then beare armes. Who of negligence stop mustard-pots with their father's pedegrees, or otherwise abuse them. The second sort are ungentle gentlemen, who being enhaunced to honour, by their fathers, on whom (though it were to their owne

worship) yet can they not keepe so much mony from the dice, as to make worshipfull obsequies for their said fathers with any point of armory: but despise the same, because (say they) those his armes were purchased for slips. Most of these desire the title of worship, but none do work the deed that appertaineth thereunto. And of these that runne so far as will not turne, old women will say, such youth will have their swing, and it be but in an halter. The third sort, and worst of all, are neither gentle, ungentle, or ungentle gentle, but very stubble curs, and be neither doers, sufferers, or well speekers of honors tokens. As of late, one of them that was called to worship in a citie within the province of Middlesex; unto whom the Herehaught came, and him saluted with joy of his new office, requesting of him to see his cote: who called unto him his maid, commanding her to fetch his cote. So, quoth the man to the Herehaught, here it is; if ye will buy it, ye shall have time of payment, as first to pay halfe in hande, and the rest by and by. The Herehaught being somewhat moved, said, I neither asked you for this cote, sheeps-cote or hogscote, but my meaning was to have seene your cote of armes. Armes, quoth he, I would have good legs, for my armes are indifferent," &c. But the popular familiarity with the subjects of heraldry and genealogy, had begun to have, as we see by this very preface of Gerard Leigh, its effect in diminishing the esteem in which ancestral distinctions were held. The next important work on heraldry which we will mention, shows an essential transition in popular feeling. Guillim's "Display of Heraldry”— composed, as Anthony-a-Wood asserts, by Dr Berkham, Dean of Boching-we find that the class of persons who, in Gerard Leigh's time, made light of bearing "cotes," and were, in his opinion, " very stubble curs," had become admirers of coat armour, and obtained grants from the College of Heralds. Gerard Leigh's first edition was in 1562, Guillim's in 1610; and in this interval, which we may call the Elizabethan era, we would place the change from the ancient to the modern sentiment of aristocracy. That new order of things then began, which has since raised the

In

* It is almost unnecessary to notice, that "called to worship," means " appointed to a worshipful office."

national prosperity to so high a pitch, in opening to aspiring adventurers of parts and spirit the avenues which lead on to fame and fortune. But with this change did undoubtedly fall to pieces the system which the Prioress, and Gerard Leigh, and Sir John Ferne, and Bossewell, wished to support, in giving to the world their heraldic and genealogical lore. Their books were read to the full as much as they desired; but their readers were not content to sit down with the knowledge that this "Worshipful Dame," or that Ryght Nobull Prince, bore such and such "cote-armoris," and came of such and such gentle houses. The sight and the history of the fesses, crosses, bends, and tressures, the lions rampant, couchant, and saliant, the fleursde-lys, the roses, the cinquefoils, of ancient houses, made the blood glow in many a plebeian cheek, and many a plebeian heart resolved to win and wear them. From this time forward, as the succeeding editions of Guillim, up to the last and best in 1724, show, heraldic bearings became multiplied, and lost in their multiplication that chaste simplicity which the earlier coats possess. If the subject were sufficiently popular, we could easily prove by quotation how radical the alteration was; but we fear the language of the gentle craft is too unintelligible to most readers to make a blazon of coats an acceptable topic to them.

But although the alteration of the developement of this sentiment is undoubtedly mortifying to genuine antiquaries, yet we cannot help thinking that, as it exists at present, it is of very high utility to society. The bearing of arms now is one of those rewards open to honest industry, which honest industry covets and values. And it values it, because the noble houses of England have lost, and can lose, none of their attachment to their own heraldic ensigns; which no multiplication of modern bearings, no intrusion upon the privileges of arms, can blemish or render less valuable; and therefore continue to use and to display them, with as much satisfaction, and as profusely as formerly, though at other times and on other trappings. The wealthy commoner who has risen from the mass of the people, knows, that with his rise, he will be enabled to use an hereditary distinction, of the same kind with that used by a Peer,

or even the Sovereign; and it seems almost demonstrable, that a priori such a circumstance would give honest industry an additional impulse, just as it is certainly proved by experience that in fact it does so. It seems, indeed, very happily ordered, that such a source of honour should exist, attainable without injury to any one, without even diminishing in any way the value of the honour to former and ancient possessors, yet nevertheless serving very sufficiently to ascertain and mark a degree of social rank. Genuine antiquaries, too, among whom we consider ourselves, are apt to be mortified at the change of the character of coats as now granted, as we hinted above. But when we can get rid of this most natural feeling, and bring our sympathies down to reason, we shall find plenty of ground on which to build many pleasant thoughts of even this slipshod heraldry. The complaint against the modern grants of arms made by the kings of arms, may be summed up in a few wordsthey lack simplicity and unity. A person who has been engaged in a particular business, chooses to have some ensigns of his occupation preserved in the shield which he is going to obtain from Mr Garter or Mr Clarencieux or Mr Norroy, to be transmitted to his heirs. Garter bows, and devises the insertion of a butt or an Angola goat:-then, his lady wife likes blue, and the College receive an intimation that Sir John wishes azure to be the field-the knight's son, who is martially inclined, desires that a cavalry sword and a pair of holsters may be introduced; and the daughter will have some favourite flower perpetuated. So (if we may venture upon a single blazon) there offers a full Patent of Arms, granting and exemplifying to Sir John and all his issue, azure, three Angola goats, browzing on as many mounts, semes of flowers proper, between as many falchions erect, pommelled and hilted or; and on a chief of the third two holster-pistols encountering each other, flammant and fumant of the second.

Now a Howard, a Seymour, or a Talbot, may smile at such a coat; but the same feeling which clothed their illustrious ancestors with the bend and cross-crosslets, the wings in lure, and the rampant lion, clothes Sir John with his quaintly imagined coat. The old barons fought for their country,

for they loved it; the new knight was honest, patient, industrious, for he loved his country too; and both own the common principle of our nature in seeking and claiming a reward, the same in kind.

And further, beyond the stimulus which the desire of heraldic distinction gives to those who are rising in the world, there is a benefit arising from it of very high consequence; namely, the tendency which it has to unite and hold together the mass of those who have a stake in the country, for their mutual preservation. No sooner do men distinctly perceive themselves to belong to a certain class -say that of the armigeri of the three kingdoms-than they feel a common interest with all their class in all that they think belongs to its safety and respectability. No matter how wide the chasms between the grades of armigeri-and we know they are very wide-yet, as such, they all are concerned to keep up the hereditary tenure of respectability, and of the property which maintains it. Perhaps it may be said that many of those -members of the Legislature, for example-who are unscrupulously engaged in the demolition of our most venerable institutions, are armigeri, nay, men of ancestry. True; but while they are thus employed in public, let us enquire what is their conduct at home, and what are their sentiments with regard to their own family and personal consequence ;— whether their own private arrangements are democratical-and whether the levelling system is carried on in the regime of their domestic establishments. We shall find, most likely, that they, too, are bound up by the strong common tie of standing in society, one of the marks of which, as we see, is the bearing of arms; and that with every wish to see their superiors brought down to them, they have no sympathies with their no less consistent fellow-democrats, who bear no arms, and think the whole theory of gentility useless and burdensome. We cannot but protest, without any qualification, against those who assume arms without either hereditary right or grant from the College. There is a regular and simple way in all the three kingdoms by which any person who thinks himself competent to bear arms, and is able to meet the expenses of a patent, may obtain them; and those

who think it worth their while to use them, should certainly be at the pains of coming by them honestly. It ought to be understood, that the circumstance of bearing the name of a family, of which the arms are known and may be found, does not in any manner entitle a person who wants a coat of arms, to take the coat of the family whose name he bears. Nothing but descent from a house lawfully bearing arms, or a grant from the College, or the special gift of the Sovereign, can authorize their use. Those engravers, therefore, who advertise in their shopwindows"arms found," are leading persons into very serious mistakes; and it were very much to be wished that the College would interfere, as it still has the power to prevent the abuses arising from the practice.

But even this delinquency gives evidence of the estimation in which the thing is held. People are unscrupulous as to the means of obtaining what they want; but they must have felt the want strongly before they became

so.

We have been induced to give this short notice on a topic which seldom comes in our way, because we think the times in which we live give a value to all which is connected with the preservation of hereditary rights. Time was, when heraldic and genealogical pursuits ranked higher than now; when Peachum did not think his "Compleat Gentleman" to be “fashioned absolute," without a chapter on heraldry, when blazoning must have been a staple of courtly talk. And further back still, when belted earls went into the battle-field with their arms embroidered on their surcoats, and their ladies welcomed them home to their halls in kirtles adorned in like manner-it seems hard to understand into what situations in life the ideas of heraldry must not have entered unbidden. These days are gone

the Earls lie on their altar-tombs in their surcoats, with their kirtled Ladies beside them—the stately ruffled and trunk-hosed gentleman of King James I.'s court kneels on his monument with his sons, and his lady with their daughters, in gradually diminishing lines behind them-and their me mories only find a resting-place in the collection of the curious and somewhat despised antiquary. But if we are as wise here as they were, we shall take what we have, and use it as we best may.

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SCENE. Before the Palace of ADMETUS.

APOLLO, with his bow and quiver, appears on the stage.

Apol. Ah, hospitable roof! where, tho' a god,
I condescended to the hireling's board:

Zeus was the cause, who, with the lightning's flame,
Transfixed my dear son Esculapius;

Whereon I slew the Cyclops, in my rage,
The one-eyed forgers of his fiery bolts;
In punishment whereof the Sire ordained
I should for wages serve a mortal man.
Here was my service done, and in this land
I tended for my host his flocks and herds,
And up to this day have preserved his house,
The holy dwelling of a holy man,

Admetus; for whose sake I tricked the Fates,
And won their promise he should 'scape the death,
Then near his door, if he could substitute

One willing, in his stead, to satisfy
Expectant Hades. But not one he found,
Although he went the round of all his friends,
Father nor mother, none except his wife,
That willing was to encounter death for him,
And look upon the pleasant light no more.
E'en now, within there, in his arms sustained,
She heaves her breath, fast drawing to her end;
For on this day she must depart from life.
But I have left the dear and friendly roof,
To avoid pollution. Lo! here cometh Death,
Priest of the dead, at his appointed time,
To lead her downward to the shades below.

DEATH enters.

Death. Ho! ho! what art thou doing here? Why art thou walking to and fro ?

To rob again of awe and fear,

And honour due, the Powers below?

Was 't not enough for thee to cheat us,
And put a trick upon the Fates,
Deferring for thy loved Admetus

His passage through the gloomy gates?
But now again, with bow and quiver,
Art mounting guard to save the wife,
That undertook then to deliver

Her husband, giving life for life?

Apol. Fear not: I hold to justice, and just pleas.
Death. In that case, why this bow?

Apol.

To carry it.
Death.

It is my wont

And to aid this house unjustly.

Apol. I'm touched at the distress of one I love.
Death. Wilt rob me of a second victim now?
Apol. No! neither did I rescue him by force.
Death. How is he, then, above, not under ground?
Apol. By substituting her, for whom thour't come.
Death. Ay, and will take her.

Apol.
Take her, then, and go :-
Though fain, I know not if I can persuade thee-
Death. To slay the victim due? it is my task.
Apol. Nay, but to lay thy hand on lingering age.
Death. I understand thy meaning and thy wish,
Apol. Is't possible Alcestis may survive,
At age arriving?

Death.

It is not; consider,

I, too, have pleasure in the dues of power.

Apol. Thy business here is only with one life.
Death. When the young die, the greater glory mine.
Apol. Should she die old, a richer burial hers.
Death. Thy law is all in favour of the rich.
Apol. What? thou a sophist, none suspecting it?
Death. They'd buy delay of death till they were old.
Apol. Wilt thou grant me this favour?

Death.

I will not; And thou art well acquainted with my mood.

Apol. Hostile to mortals, hateful to the gods.

Death. Thou canst not have all things thou shouldst not have.
Apol. Though fierce, yet shalt thou stop in this proceeding;

For such a man, by King Eurystheus sent

To bring him chariot steeds from wintry Thrace,

Will hither come, and in this house be guest,
That shall from thee this woman take by force.

I'll owe thee, then, no thanks, but hate instead,

And thou wilt have to do what now I ask.

Death. For all thy words thy gain is nothing more;
This woman shall descend to Hades' house.

I'll now advance on her, and with this sword
Begin the consecration; when this blade
Has lopt the doomed hair of any head,
That soul is sacred to the gods below.

[APOLLO quits the scene.

DEATH enters the Palace.

The CHORUS then enter in two divisions.

1st Semich. Why this silence so profound,

In the house, and all around?

2d Semich. Why is there none to let us know If for the dead our tears should flow;

Or if the queen, so dear to sight,
Yet lives and looks upon the light,
The wife that is, by common fame,
The best that ever had the name?

1st Semich. Does any hear a lamentation

As of a house in desolation,

Sobs or sounds that hands awaken

In grief for one by death o'ertaken?

2d Semich. No! nor is a servant near :

'Mid the woe's o'erwhelming wave,

Pæan! at our wish appear,

Healing god! appear to save!

1st Semich. The silence, of itself alone,

Is token plain she is not gone.

2d Semich.

Whence is it?

We have not this hope of yours:
Speak, and make it ours.

1st Semich. How could Admetus, hid from all,

Have made his consort's funeral?

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