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Decorations Taken from Other Sources. - Hatchments: Palmer
Trusbuts. De Ros. - Another ornament to the shield that recalls the old Crusader days is the Palmer's Scrip.
In the chancel of a church in England, where some one by the name of Palmer is buried, is this queer epitaph: - "Palmers all our faders were - I a Palmer lived here, And travell'd still, till worn with age I ended this world's pilgrimage On the blest Ascension day, In the cheerful month of May, A thousand with four hundred seven I took my journey hence to Heaven."
DECORATIONS TAKEN FROM OTHER SOURCES.
Perhaps you know the difference between a Palmer and a Pilgrim. The name palmer was given from the fact that their staves were usually made of the palm tree, which they carried as they returned from the Holy Wars; but the real difference between the two devotees was that a pilgrim might mean only one who perhaps had visited the shrine of some saint, such as that of Thomas à Becket; while a palmer always meant that a long and toilful journey, in which voluntary poverty added misery to his weariness, had been taken to the far distant Holy Sepulchre: - "The faded palm-branch in his hand Showed pilgrim to the Holy Land."
A pilgrim had some dwelling-place, but a palmer had none; then, the pilgrim travelled to some specified spot, but the palmer went to any place, provided his journey comprised a visit to Jerusalem. The pilgrim must pay his own expenses; but the palmer must be absolutely and wilfully poor. The pilgrim might cease to be such; but the palmer-never.
The scrip was therefore frequently placed upon the shield by the descendants of the dust-begrimed, foot-sore, but highly honored palmer.
Another charge is that of many families whose name ends in "ton," and who have adopted as a bearing upon their shield a large barrel, or "tun," with a representation of the preceding syllables surmounting it - as Burton - a bird upon a tun. - The Buckle is a curious little charge, which has usually quite a history when it is allowed to appear upon a shield; and the Pelhams, Earls of Chichester, account for the prominent place it fills upon theirs by taking us back to the early wars between France and England. King John of France, being sorely pressed by his English enemies, fled to Poitiers with his son and several great nobles. 10 Pelham.
But the city closed its gates; and, all their supplications and threats being of no avail, they were compelled to turn and face their foes, who were soon swarming about them. The king was recognized, and many were the shouts of "Sir, yield, or you are dead!" There could be but little resistance made, and the king yielded; but the knight to whom he did so found it impossible to keep his prey, and the king was taken and retaken so many times that finally not less than ten knights and esquires challenged the honor of being the one to whom his capture was due. The most conspicuous of these claimants were Sir Roger la Warr and John de Pelham, the king having surrendered his sword to them. As a reward, John de Pelham was knighted, and the buckle of the belt to which the sword was attached was placed upon the shield. The buckle also appears upon their badge, and can be seen in all ecclesiastical buildings founded or aided by them, and upon various architectural ornamentations of their manors at Laughton and elsewhere; on their old seals; even on the sign of an inn in the neighborhood of their estate at Bishopstone; and often on the cast-iron chimney-backs in the farm-houses of the estate; on the mile-stones, and as the mark stamped upon the sheep. Indeed, the whole of that portion of eastern Sussex where they make their home seems to almost grow and harvest the Pelham buckle. This recalls the story told of the vain old Earl of Bute, who, it was said, had even the leaden waterpipes of his castle ornamented with large coronets. DECORATIONS TAKEN FROM OTHER SOURCES.