184 CEREMONIAL INSTITUTIONS. 



ensign of the Mexican empire was an eagle in the act of 

 darting upon a tiger/ recalling the animal-names of the 

 kings, we are shown how, at any rate in some cases, the 

 distinctive marks on the flags of leaders represented their 

 names; carrying us back to those achievements in war and 

 the chase which originated their names. 



That the devices on flags were in early stages commonly 

 of this kind (though naturally not in cases like those of 

 Sandwich Islanders and Fijians above named, whose habi 

 tats contained no wild beasts of fit characters) seems im 

 plied by the fact that even still, the predatory mammals and 

 birds of prey which, in early times, mostly furnished the 

 animal names of great warriors, still linger on flags, or on 

 the standards carrying them: the reason for the gradual 

 subordination of the animal-figure being obviously the 

 growth of that expanse of colour which gives the needful 

 conspicuousness. 



411. And here we come upon the now-familiar in 

 ference that heraldic badges have descended from these 

 primitive tribal badges, or totems. That the names of 

 tribes, in so many parts of the world derived from animals, 

 and often joined with beliefs that the animals giving the 

 names were the actual ancestors, sometimes originate tribal 

 badges, we have direct proof. Of the Thlinkeets we read 

 in Bancroft that 



&quot;The whole nation is separated into two great divisions or clans, 

 one of which is called the Wolf, and the other the Raven. Upon 

 their houses, boats, robes, shields, and wherever else they can find 

 a place for it, they paint or carve their crest, an heraldic device of 

 the beast or the bird designating the clan to which the owner be 

 longs.&quot; I 



With such support for an inference reasonably to be 

 drawn, we cannot but accept the hypothesis that the heral 

 dic devices which early prevailed among the civilized, had 

 a like genesis. When we read that in China, &quot; the Man- 



