only two honours universally acknowledged. Knighthood
is the source of all honours, and of all military glory, and an honour
esteemed by and conferred upon kings; without which they were
heretofore thought incomplete, and could not confer that honour on
others, no more than ordination could be conferred by one unordained:
so that there was a very near connexion between sovereignty and
knighthood. And besides, the propriety of the open helmet with a visor
for a knight, and the helmet guard-visure for a king, the latter is
more ornamental, especially if, according to the modern practice, the
barrs are gold. As the king's helmet is without a visor, and barred, so
is that of the nobility in imitation of it, but turned to the right as
a proper distinction as, in like manner, that of the gentry differs
from the knights. As there are in fact but two orders of men, nobility
of which the king is the first degree, and gentry of which knights are
the first, so they are by this means sufficiently distinguished
according to their respective orders and degrees: the first order
distinguished by the barred helmet, the gentry by the visored helmet
with proper differences of the second degrees of each class from the
first; and all other distinctions more than this are unnecessary and
useless.

"The helmet does not seem to have been formerly used but in a military
way, and affairs of chivalry. I do not find any helmets upon the
monuments of our Kings of England, nor upon other ancient monuments,
nor upon any of the Great Seals, coins, or medals. Upon the plates of
the Knights of the Garter at Windsor, all degrees used the old profile
close helmet till about 1588, some few excepted; and soon after, the
helmet with barrs came into fashion, and was used for all degrees of
nobility, and it has continued ever since; and the same has been used
for all degrees of nobility upon the plates of the Knights of the Bath,
those that are knights only using a knight's helmet. And the same may
be observed in Sir Edward Walker's _Books of the Nobility from the
Restoration to the Revolution_, wherein all degrees have the helmet
turned towards the right, showing four barrs; the sovereign's being
full with seven barrs."

G.

* * * * *

HAMPDEN'S DEATH.

(Vol. viii., p. 495.)

"On the 21st of