The Blue Ensign is conferred on certain Yacht Clubs by special Admiralty warrant. The Royal Eastern, Royal Barrow, Royal Clyde, Royal Highland, Royal Northern, Royal Western of England, Royal Cinque Ports, Royal Albert, Royal Dorset, etc., fly the Blue Ensign pure and simple; others have a distinguishing badge on the fly, thus the Royal Irish has a golden harp and crown, the Royal Ulster a white shield with the red hand, the Royal Cornwall the Prince of Wales' Feathers, the Royal Harwich a golden rampant lion, and so forth. The clubs flying the Red Ensign change it slightly from that flown by the Merchant Service; thus the Royal St. George, Royal Victoria, and Royal Portsmouth have a golden crown in the centre of the Union canton, while the Royal Yorkshire has a white rose and gold crown on the fly, and the Royal Dart a golden dart and crown. Each club has also its distinguishing burgee, and ordinarily of the same colour as its ensign; thus, though the Royal Clyde and the Royal Highland both fly the plain blue ensign, the Royal Clyde burgee has on it the yellow shield and red lion rampant, while the Royal Highland has the white cross of St. Andrew. Fig. 100 is the burgee of the Ranelagh Club, Fig. 101 of the Yare, Fig. 102 of the Royal Thames, Fig. 103 of the Dublin Bay Club. Besides these club ensigns and burgees, each yacht bears its owner's individual device, that is supposed to distinguish it from all others, though one finds, in looking through a series of such flags, that some of the simpler devices are borne by more than one yacht. Every yacht club has its special burgee, which is flown by each yacht in the club at her truck, but when the vessel is racing the individual flag takes its place. Many of these flags, though simple in character, are very effective and striking. The lower flags on Plate XII. are good typical examples. Fig. 121 is the yacht flag of His Royal Highness the Prince of Wales--the flag of the well-known _Britannia_; and Figs. 122 and 123 are those respectively of the equally-famed _Ailsa_ and _Valkyrie_. {74} Merchant vessels are permitted to adopt any House or Company flag on condition that it does not resemble any national flag. Its great use is that it should be clearly distinctive; and many of the flags employed are of strict heraldic propriety, and very attractive, while others are about as unsatisfactory and bald as they well could be. It would clearly be a painful and invidious thing to pick out any of these latter, so we can only suggest that any of our readers who have an opportunity of visiting busy ports, such as London, Southampton, Bristol, Liverpool, should collect their own awful examples and paint them in the margin of this page.