- s. viii. NOV. 9, loci.] NOTES AND QUERIES.
379
bers of the several classes remained at the
above figure, though power is reserved to
the sovereign under the letters patent of
1850 to increase the number of any class.
Doubtless many of your readers are familiar with the insignia of the order : the badge, consisting of a gold cross of fourteen points (in seven rays), having a circular centre of blue enamel within a motto-band of the same colour bearing the motto " Auspicium melio- ris sevi "; the collar, consisting of six golden crowned lions of England, eight Maltese crosses enamelled white, and eight golden ciphers : the ribbon, of three equal stripes, two of Saxon blue, the centre one of scarlet ; and the star, consisting in the case of the Grand Crosses of seven rays, each composed of as many smaller ones of silver, the intervals being filled with small rays of gold ; and in the case of the Knight Com- manders, composed of four silver rays in the general shape of a cross patee.
Those of your readers who desire further details relating to these insignia I would refer to pp. 354-5 of the volume above men- tioned.
Dr. Woodward was of opinion and he is a high authority that this extension of the order so as to embrace the British colonies in general has rendered the original design and embellishments of the insignia insufficient for the purposes for which the order has now been adapted, the condition of affairs which originated the order having disappeared. He says (p. 355) :
" The withdrawal of the British protection from the Ionian Islands and the extension and applica- tion of the order as a colonial distinction have ren- dered the insignia no longer appropriate to this latter purpose, and a change which would make them more fatting to the present circumstances of the order is certainly desirable. The seven rays of the cross, the use of the sept-insular lion (indicative of long past Venetian rule), and especially the motto, 'Auspicium melioris sevi,' have lest whatever ap- propriateness they might have had when the seven Ionian Islands were made subject to the British Crown."
traced to some author of antiquity, all that
has been discovered is that the legend " Aus-
picium melioris aevi " occurs on a coin of
Wolfgang Wilhelm, Count Palatine of the
Rhine, in 1642. It is also cited in Menestrier's
1 Philosophia Imaginum,' p. 699 ; and the same
words, Nicolas states, form the motto of
the Duke of St. Albans, the descendant of a
natural son of Charles II. Can no scholarly
reader of ' N. & Q.' help us here ?
Loth as I may be to disagree with any- thing that Dr. Woodward has written, I must say that I can see no good reason for any such suggested change in the motto of the order. The circumstances which gave rise to its adop- tion in 1818 are, although greatly changed, in my opinion just as applicable now as then ; and at the beginning of the twentieth century we all trust that we are on the eve of that " better age " which a higher appreciation of each other and the establishment of that closer union between the mother country and her colonies which recent events have called forth must inevitably bring to pass. Therefore, I say, let the motto stand. It is a good one for all time. But I do agree with Dr. Woodward that the rest of the insignia might well undergo a change and improve- ment more emblematic of and more suited to the higher position that our colonies have taken as a factor even in European politics.
The insignia of the principal public orders instituted since the foundation of that of St. Michael and St. George, namely, the Order of the Star of India, instituted in 1861 (mem- bers of which now take precedence of those of St. Michael and St. George, though at its institution the latter ranked next to that of the Bath*), and the Order of the Indian Empire, instituted in 1878, both bear distinct references to the objects for which they were founded. Those of the Order of St. Michael and St. George may have some reference to the object for which it was founded, but have none for that for which it is now alone used except, as I suggest, in the applicability still
- At p. 353 Dr. Woodward states that the members
of the Order of St. Michael and St. George, as originally constituted, ranked immediately after members of the corresponding ranks in the Order of the Star of India. This is, of course, a slip upon Dr. Woodward's part, for the Order of the Star of India was not instituted, as he well knew, until 1861. What he should have said was that they ranked immediately after corresponding members of the Order of the Bath, which was indeed the order of precedence given them by the letters patent of 1850. It was not until the statutes of 4 Dec., 1868, which extended the order to the colonies, that this precedence was taken away in favour of the Star of India.
