Heraldic Notes (Vol. viii., p. 265.).—The bearing of the arms of Clare Hall by Dr. Blythe is not strictly correct, because, with the exception of the three principal Kings of Arms, the Earl Marshal, the Master of Ordnance, and a few others especially, arms of office do not exist in England. The general mode of bearing them is by impalement, giving the preference (dexter) to the arms of dignity. In the example under notice, the arms of dignity or office are borne upon a pile, which has somewhat the appearance of an inverted chevron. It is not at all a common mode of bearing additions; but I remember one case, viz. the grant by King Henry VIII. to the Seymours, after his marriage to Lady Jane, of the lions of England on a pile.
Broctuna.
Bury, Lancashire.
Christian Names (Vol. vii. passim).—May I be permitted to correct one or two errors in Mr. Bates's Note on this subject, Vol. vii. p. 627.?
The person described as a "certain M. L-P. Saint-Florentin" was no less a person than the Duke de la Vrillière, who filled several important offices during the reign of Louis XV. The allusion in the epigram to his "trois noms" has no reference to his names, whether Christian or patronymic, in the sense in which the question has been discussed in "N. & Q.," but to the three titles which he successively bore as a public man. He commenced his career as M. de Phélippeaux; was afterwards created Comte de Saint-Florentin, and sometime before his death was raised to the dignity of Duke de la Vrillière.
My authority for this statement is the cotemporary work, Les Mémoires secrets de Bachaumont, where, under date of December, 1770, the epigram is thus introduced, with a variation in the first line:
"Un autre plaisant a fait d'avance l'épitaphe de M. le duc de la Vrillière. Elle roule sur ses trois noms différents de Phélippeaux, Saint-Florentin, et la Vrillière:
'Ci-git, malgré son rang, un homme fort commun,
Ayant porté trois noms, et n'en laissant aucun.'"
The sense being, that his titles had been his only distinction, and that even they had not been sufficient to rescue his character from obscurity and contempt.
However "applicable" this epigram may be to the bearers or borrowers of three names, it will be some comfort to them to know that its point was not directed against them, but against a class of men of much higher pretensions, of one of whom it has been said:
"He left the name, at which the world grew pale,