Page:The Peerage, Baronetage and Knightage of the British Empire Part 2.djvu/15

 INTRODUCTORY NOTICE. patentee or an early successor, probably a person living in the seventeenth century, or when a family is resident abroad, it is manifest that some legal means of ascertaining the validity of claims to such honours is urgently required. A royal warrant dated 3 Dec. 1783, rendered it necessary for each newly-designated Baronet to enter his arms and pedigree in the College of Arms before his patent could be completed and his name appear in the Gazette. This warrant also pi-ovided that Baronets succeeding under patents of an earlier date should also be compelled to record their descent ; unfortunately for the order, this clause was rescinded by royal warrant 28 Feb. 1785, for, hadlt been still in force, it would have been possible ere this to have given an official coup de grace to all soi-disant Baronets. As matters now stand the Crown is without a tribunal authorised to decide upon such claims as those which appear in the supplemental collection entitled " Chaos," The assumption of the dignity of a Baronet of Nova Scotia is sometimes supported by the inquest of a Scottish jury. But claims of this character involve the most difficult question of pedigree, and therefore a service of heirship by a jury, biassed in all probability by local influences in favour of an unopposed claimant, may easily be little more than a farce. It is difficult for the uninitiated even under the most favourable circumstances to follow the intricacies of descents such as Gordon of Letterfourie, Richardson of Pitfour, Moncrieffe of Tullibole, and many others, involving proof of the extinction of every possibly intermediate line for several centuries back? Such services at the best must always be received with the greatest caution. The editors of works on this subject cannot divest themselves of some share of responsibility in the matter ; it is true that the original causes of confusion are generally to be found in the varied remainders contained in the Patents of Nova Scotia Baronets, coupled with the absence of official registration; but it is the duty of an Editor to satisfy himself as to the jyrima facie validity of each title instead of leaving it to the penetration of his readers. In the absence of an authenticated pedigree these printed accounts do not make a man a Baronet, nor does an announcement in the public press ; neither on the other hand do the indirect acknowledgments which have in some cases been made, not only by a Lord Lyon and an Ulster king of arms, but also unwittingly in appointments to the public services. Such accidental acknowledgments can in no way be cited as confirming these honours, much less as conferring them ; if they did so, they would be a dii-ect encroachment on the royal prerogative. So far as my genealogical acumen has enabled me, I have excluded the more question- able assumptions from the main body of this work. These are to be found, as before stated, under the designation " Chaos " at the end of the Baronetage, accompanied by explanatory notes, including references to other doubtful pedigrees and obscure points ; it is however more than probable that there are weak points in some of the other titles, which I have not discovered. The list of Knights Baronets of Scotland, compiled by Kobert Milne, writer to the signet, in the early part of the last century,* is an important document for the history of that Order ; I have therefore published it m extenso. A Roll of the earlier Baronets has also been printed in a recent publication of the Bannatyne Club. I have used this list to complete that of Milne, and have added some remarks on the later history of the baronet- cies. By the aid of these lists and other authorities I have been able in some cases to correct the received accounts of the origin of these honours. - 1 Dec. 1747 aged, it is said, 105 years.
 * Robert Milne, the comj^iler of this list, registered his arms in the Lyon Office about 1672, and died