The Manual of Heraldry; Fifth Edition | Page 4

charged with an anchor, the centre point with the red cross; each of the succeeding sons were differenced by charges on the points of the labels.
All the figures denoting differences are also used as perfect charges on the shield; but their size and situation will sufficiently determine whether the figure is used as a perfect coat of arms, or is introduced as a difference or diminution.
Sisters have no differences in their coats of arms. They are permitted to bear the arms of their father, as the eldest son does after his father's decease.
Guillim, Leigh, and other ancient armorists mention divers figures, which, they assert, were formerly added to coats of arms as marks of degradation for slander, cowardice, murder, and other crimes, and to them they give the name of abatements of honour; others have called them blots in the escutcheon: but as no instance can be produced of such dishonourable marks having been borne in a coat of arms, they may justly be considered as chimerical, or at any rate obsolete, and unworthy of consideration at the present time. Porney pithily observes, "that arms being marks of honour, they cannot admit of any note of infamy, nor would any one bear them if they were so branded. It is true, a man may be degraded for divers crimes, particularly high treason; but in such cases the escutcheon is reversed, trod upon, and torn in pieces, to denote a total extinction and suppression of the honour and dignity of the person to whom it belonged."
The only abatement used in heraldry is the baton: this denotes illegitimacy. It is borne in the escutcheons of the dukes that assume the royal arms as the illegitimate descendants of King Charles the Second.
[Illustration: Baton]

CHAP. IV.
HONOURABLE ORDINARIES.
Honourable ordinaries are the original marks of distinction bestowed by sovereigns on subjects that have become eminent for their services, either in the council or the field of battle. Volumes have been written upon the origin and form of the honourable ordinaries. These long and tedious inquiries can only be interesting to antiquaries: it is sufficient for the tyro in Heraldry to know that they are merely broad lines or bands of various colours, which have different names, according to the place they occupy in the shield; ancient armorists admit but nine honourable ordinaries--the chief, the pale, the bend, the bend sinister, the fess, the bar, the chevron, the cross, and the saltier.
The chief is an ordinary terminated by an horizontal line, which, if it is of any other form but straight, its form must be expressed; it is placed in the upper part of the escutcheon, and occupies one third of the field.
Ex. Argent, on a chief, gules, two mullets, sable.
[Illustration: Chief]
Any of the lines before described may be used to form the chief.
[Illustration: Chief]
Ex. Argent, a chief, azure, indented.
The chief has a diminutive called a _fillet_; it must never be more than one fourth the breadth of the chief.
[Illustration: Fillet]
Ex. Or, a chief, purpure, in the lower part a fillet, azure.
This ordinary may be charged with a variety of figures, which are always named after the tincture of the chief.
It may be necessary to inform the reader that, in describing a coat of arms, the general colour of the shield or the field is first described, then the honourable ordinaries, their tinctures, then the object with which they are charged. We shall have to remark more particularly on the order of describing ordinaries, tinctures, and charges on coats of arms, when we treat of the rules of heraldry; but the student might have been confused if this brief direction had been omitted, as we shall have to describe every shield of arms in the same order.
The pale is an honourable ordinary, consisting of two perpendicular lines drawn from the top to the base of the escutcheon, and contains one third of the width of the field.
[Illustration: Pale]
Ex. Azure, a pale, or.
The pale may be formed of any of the lines before described; it is then called a _pale engrailed, a pale dancette_, &c.
The pale has a diminutive called the pallet, which is one half the width of the pale.
[Illustration: Pallet]
Ex. Argent, a pallet, gules.
The pale has another diminutive one fourth its size; it is called an endorse.
[Illustration: Endorse]
Ex. Argent, a pale between two endorses, gules.
The pale and the pallet may receive any charge; but the endorse is never to be charged with any thing.
THE BEND.
The bend is an honourable ordinary, formed by two diagonal lines drawn from the dexter chief to the sinister base, and contains the fifth part of the field if uncharged; but if charged with other figures, the third part of the field.
[Illustration: Bend]
Ex. Argent, a bend, vert.
The bend has four diminutives, viz. the garter which is half the breadth of the bend.
[Illustration: Garter]
Ex.