It is to be hoped that heraldic propriety will prevail over a practice originating in obvious error, and that our national flag will be flown according to its true blazon. The correction would be very easily made. The reduction of the breadth of the border of St. George's cross and the slight increase in the width of the Irish saltire would be little noticed, while, besides correcting obvious errors, it would have the advantage of bringing the flag, in one important respect, into conformity with the design as represented on the coinage. On the reverse of our beautiful bronze coins the St. George's cross on Britannia's shield is fimbriated as it ought to be, that is, by the narrow border prescribed by the written blazon. [Illustration: UNION FLAGS AND PENDANT. PLATE III.] [Illustration: Fig. 27.] But if the penny is right in that respect, it exhibits another extraordinary example of our slipshod heraldry, by a variation of a different and more startling kind. My complaint against the flag, as made, is, that it represents four crosses, but on the penny there are only two. This was all right when the design was first made in the reign of Charles II., but when the third cross was added to the flag the three crosses should have appeared on the coin. A desire to adhere to the original design cannot certainly be pleaded, for there have been many changes in this figure of Britannia. She was first placed there by Charles II. in honour of the beautiful Duchess of Richmond, who sat to the sculptor for the figure. But her drapery on the coin of those days was very scanty, and her semi-nude state was hardly in keeping with the stormy waves beside which she was seated. Queen Anne, like a modest lady as she was, put decent clothing on her, and made her stand upright, and took away her shield, crosses and all. In the subsequent reigns she was allowed to sit down again, and she got back her shield, with the trident in her left hand and an olive-branch in the right. On the present coinage--a copy of which (the penny) is shown in Fig. 27--the drapery of Queen Anne is retained, but the figure is entirely turned round, and faces the sinister side of the coin, instead of the dexter, as at first, and the olive-branch (_absit omen_) has been taken away. But with all these changes there remain only two crosses on the shield. The reader will naturally suppose, however, that the omission consisted in not adding the Irish saltire to that of Scotland, which had been there from the first. But no. In this instance there was certainly no "injustice to Ireland," for the extraordinary thing is, that the St. Andrew's cross has been taken away altogether, and the saltire of Ireland, distinguished by its fimbriated border, has been put in its place, Scotland being not now represented on the coin at all. Of course this has arisen from mere carelessness at the Mint, but it is an error which ought to be at once corrected.