32 CEREMONIAL INSTITUTIONS. 



&quot; we.&quot; Anciently there were two heraldic provinces, 

 with their respective chief heralds, like two dioceses. Fur 

 ther development produced a garter king-at-arms, with pro 

 vincial kings-at-arms presiding over minor heraldic officers; 

 and, in 1-183, all were incorporated into the College of 

 Heralds. As in France, visitations were made for the pur 

 pose of verifying existing titles and honours, and authoriz 

 ing others; and funeral rites were so far under heraldic 

 control that, among the nobility, no one could be buried 

 without the assent of the herald. 



&quot;Why these structures which discharged ceremonial 

 functions once conspicuous and important, dwindled, while 

 civil and ecclesiastical structures developed, it is easy to see. 

 Propitiation of the living has been, from the outset, neces 

 sarily more localized than propitiation of the dead. The 

 existing ruler can be worshipped only in his presence, or, at 

 any rate, within his dwelling or in its neighbourhood. 

 Though in Porn adoration was paid to images of the living 

 Yncas; and though in Madagascar King Kadama, when 

 absent, had his praises sung in the words &quot; God is gone to 

 the west, Radama is a mighty bull; &quot; yet, generally, the 

 obeisances and laudations expressing subordination to the 

 great man while alive 1 , are not made when they cannot be 

 witnessed by him or his immediate dependants. But 

 when the great man dies and there begins the fear of his 

 ghost, conceived as able to reappear anywhere, propitiations 

 are less narrowly localized; and in proportion as, with 

 formation of larger societies, there comes development of 

 deities greater in supposed power and range, dread of them 

 and reverence for them are felt simultaneously over wide 

 areas. Hence the official propitiators, multiplying and 

 spreading, severally carry on their worships in many places 

 at the same time there arise large bodies of ecclesiastical 

 officials. T^ot for these reasons alone, however, 



does the ceremonial organization fail to grow as the other or 

 ganizations do. Development of the latter, causes decay of 



