PERMANENT ADDITIONAL FIGURES. 87 "This advice," the principal Houses they are come of.” adds Nisbet, "is congruous to our law, and consonant to the principles of prudence and reason; and I wish from my heart that our gentry may take more heed to this than hitherto they have done, and may apply to the Lyon Office for suitable differences, and not assume them at their own hand, or by the advice of some presumptuous sciolist, whereby oftentimes their posterity suffer prejudice." Of the numerous modes which have been adopted for distinguishing Cadets, when they "erect and establish new Houses," the most common, and probably the most satisfactory, is the assumption of conspicuous and permanent additional figures. These, however, must not be confounded with the minute and temporary marks of Cadency-label, crescent, mullet, etc.,-termed "differ entiæ consanguineorum," which are usually assumed by a man's sons, during his lifetime, in order to indicate their respective degrees of birth. The use of the latter, 1 Essay on Marks of Cadency, p. 15. 2 See Plate IV. 3 Most of the old writers on Heraldry have assigned a figurative import to these differences of consanguinity. According to Mackenzie, the eldest son carries a Label of three points, in the lifetime of his father, "to signify that he is but the third person, his father being one, his mother another, and himself the third." "Ou un label dasure avoit, The second has a Crescent, to show 3 by adding to its estate and repute, the crescent being, in the words of Camden, "the double blessing, which giveth future hope of increase." The third son carries a Mullet, or spurrowel, "to incite him to chivalry." The fourth, a Martlet, represented without feet, "to signify that as that bird seldom lights on the land, so younger brothers have little land to rest upon, but the wings of their own endeavours." The fifth, an Annulet, or ring, to encourage him "to achieve great actions, the badge whereof was, in old times, jus aureorum annulorum.” The sixth, a 88 TEMPORARY MARKS OF CADENCY. as perpetual and hereditary figures, although occasional among some of the most eminent families both in England and Scotland, has been very justly censured by various heraldic authorities, including Dugdale, Spelman, Mackenzie, and Nisbet. Dugdale considers that these minute differences do not show the time of the descent; "neither can it be known," he says, "which of the crescent-bearers was the uncle or nephew. And further it is a very usual matter for every new riser at this day, if he can find that there is any of the like surname that |