290
NOTES AND QUERIES. [io* s. n. OCT. s, im.
Soc. Proc., vol. xxxix. (N.S. xix.), pt. ii. p. 11,
n. 24, and 'Magna Vita S. Hugonis,' Rolls
Series, p. 67. But this can scarcely be
accepted at the present time as a satisfactory
explanation of the origin of the word.
H. W. UNDERDOWN.
THE TRICOLOUR.
(10 th S. ii. 247.)
EVERY one at all conversant with the history of flags knows that the adoption of red, white, and blue at the French Revolution was no new thing. The colours pervade the whole French naval history, certainly from 1545, when they must have been worn by the French ships under Annebaut, whose arms were Gules, a cross vair ; for by the " ordonnance " in force the ships wore the colours of the admiral's arms. The order of colours was, at that date, probably a matter of taste ; and so it continued. Bouille ('Les Drapeaux Frangais ') gives numerous illustra- tions of flags of land and sea use, in which it can easily be seen the red, white, and blue predominate. Thus, p. 232, Flarnrne des Galeres, longitudinal stripes, blue, white, red, -charged with yellow fleurs de lis, "sous Louis XIV."; and "Etendart des Galeres," also "sous Louis XIV.," longitudinal, red, white, red, charged with the royal arms, azure, three fleurs de lis or, surmounted by royal crown or Earlier still, we have, p. 223, "pavilion rangais, 1462," blue hoist, charged with three fleurs de lis; white fly, charged with one large red ball. 1583, a white cross ; the quarters, 1 and 4 red, 2 and 3 blue. And "flarnme, 1583, blue, white, red, horizontal. These instances are sufficient to show that there would be nothing very extraordinary in the .trench ships in the picture referred to wearing a flag similar to the modern tricolour. But in point of fact they do not. I know the picture we had it at the Naval Exhibition at Chelsea in 1891, and it is reproduced in Colomb's 'Naval Warfare,' p. 128 and may say there is nothing at the mastheads that can properly be called a flag. Vanes there are, but these are indistinct, and may, or may not, be blue, white, red, as in the modern French ensign. I refreshed my memory by writing to Admiral Henderson, the present Admiral Super- intendent, who answers that the colours are indistinct, but " in one the inner part (sc. the hoist) looks as if it might nave been red. I don't think it could be sworn to." But if red, then not the modern
tricolour. That with the three colours, if
in stripes, white should come in the middle
was, irrespective of the heraldic law, almost
a necessity ; blue and red in juxtaposition
set the teeth on edge. In the Dutch flag
the "Oranje boven" fixed the position of
the red, when in stripes ; in the French the
arrangement was doubtful, and in the first
revolutionary flag it was red, white, blue,
counting from the hoist. In 1794 it was
changed to blue, white, red, and so it con-
tinued at sea ; but in 1848 it was changed
on the principle, dear to all radicals, that
whatever is, is wrong to red, white, blue ; to
be rechanged, after a few weeks of loudly
expressed discontent, to the blue, white, red.
I remember the late Sir Cooper Key telling
me that he was at Palermo at the time, when
one mail brought the French ships there the
order to make the change, and the next, an
order to change back again " as you were."
But all this is, or ought to be, familiar to every one who has, even cursorily, looked into the history of the flag. The antiquity of the tricolour in our own country is perhaps not so familiar. Some five-and-twenty or thirty years ago, I went to Aberdeen by steamer, and going down the river took an opportunity to question the captain about the flag which I had seen flying over the company's office at the wharf, and which was then flying at our foremast head. "Captain," I said, " do you mind telling me why, at your wharf and here, at the fore, you are flying the French ensign?" "No, sir," said he with decision. " No ? " echoed I. " But, look, you don't mean to say that isn't the French flag ? " Well, sir," he answered, " the French fly it, but it 's ours ; it 's the flag of the company, and dates back to the time of the Union. All through the eighteenth century it was worn by the old Aberdeen smacks." " That may be," I said ; " but I fancy you might have trouble if you met a French man-of-war." "I don't know about that," he replied ; " but it 's quite certain that it was our flag before it was theirs."
I think we may say it is the Scots blue, the English white and red. I am sorry to say that I have not seen an Aberdeen steamer since ; but I do not suppose the company have felt it necessary to change their old flag. I am sure I do not see why they should, though the captain of a French man-of-war might think differently.
But to return to the Devonport picture. It does not seem to represent any reality. The fight is altogether imaginary as imaginary as the naval action described in wondrous detail in Fenimore Cooper's * Two Admirals.'
