8*26 K N I G H 
emblem of the element of water, feems to creep out into ex¬ 
igence. We muft conclude our obfervations, which perhaps 
may appear irrelevantto chivalrous difquilitions, with this 
reflection: that the idea of a general deluge exifts in the 
mind of the inhabitants of India, by traditional commu¬ 
nications; and that the knowledge, which the ancient in¬ 
habitants of thofe remote countries were poflefled of in 
times now loft to the memory of man, was molt likely of 
more extent and greater certainty than all the fciences 
which we fo proudly boaft of. 
This order, if fo we may call it, was inftitufed in the 
year 1S04. For the iniignia, above defcribed, fee Plate V. 
CXXXVI. The Order of the Iron Crown, in Lom¬ 
bardy. When we perul'e the lore of ancient romancers, 
or poets of the eavlieft times, who, in the ablence of hif- 
torians, are our only guides, we often meet with infignia 
of royalty, armours of knights, or foundation-ftones of 
cities, imprefled, nobody knows how, with fome talifma- 
nic power : ideas which our anceftors borrowed from the 
lively imagination of the eaftern .writers, and which, 
through the channel of the Arabs under the fucceflive ca¬ 
liphates, flowed down to Boyardo, Ariofto, Tafl'o, and 
others ; and from them to us, with all the embellifliments 
which the Italian mufe could add to the charms of orien¬ 
tal fitlion. The coronation-chair, kept in Weftminlter- 
abbey ; the London-ltone, which has lately been moved 
from its place, to the great aftonifliment of the inhabitants 
of Canon-ftreet, without earthquakes, peftilence, or tre¬ 
mendous figns in the firmanent; and feveral other fpell- 
bound things which it is not in our plan to enumerate here ; 
are of the lame nature, and owe the refpeCl paid to them 
to a fort of popular luperftition. Such was the idea of the 
Iron Crown in Lombardy. It is reported that the ancient 
kings of that country, after the entire fubverfion of the 
Roman empire, uled to wear this crown, which was fup- 
pofed to impart, by occult virtue, fupreme power over the 
nation. It was confequently efteemed of fo much impor¬ 
tance that, when the emperor Henry VII. appeared in Italy 
in 1311, and caufed himfelf to be crowned at Milan, the 
Guelphs, to defeat his purpole, concealed the iron crown of 
the Lombard kings, as if they regarded the right of reign¬ 
ing over them as attached to that circlet of metal. But 
Henry’s will was not to be flopped by fo trifling acircum- 
ftance ; he ordered a new crown to be made, with which 
the ceremony of the coronation was performed: but (and 
this faft increafed the fuperftitious belief) his reign termi¬ 
nated in a few months. 
Bonaparte was crowned king of Italy at Milan in May 
1805. When he placed the iron crown upon his head, 
he pronounced aloud : Dieu me la donne : garc a qui 
la touche. “ God gives it me: woe to him that prefumes 
to touch it.’’ After his inaugural fpeech, he immediately 
proceeded to inltitute an order of knighthood, called the 
Order of the Iron Crown, for the kingdom of Italy. It 
confills of flxty great officers of ftate, one hundred comman¬ 
ders, and five hundred knights. The badge is a repre- 
fentation of the crown, and the motto as above: Dieu me 
la donne : gare it qui la touche. It is a queftion not eafily 
decided, whether this was an original creation or a mere 
revival; as fome authors pretend that this order of knight¬ 
hood never exifted, and others aflert that it exiftedin very 
remote times indeed, and remained in vigour till the year 
773, when, the kingdom of Lombardy being at an end, 
the order became extinct. Whatever may be the cafe, it 
cannot be denied, that, as nations have too often felt the 
weight of an iron Jceptre, the choice of an iron crown can¬ 
not be very aufpicious and promiffory of much of that 
fort of happinefs which refults from mildnefs of govern¬ 
ment. 
CXXXVII. The Order of the Tower and Sword, 
in Brafil. Anticipating and prefuming upon the infcru- 
table decrees of Providence, the emperor of the French 
(as if intoxicated with the fumes of the incenle which 
flattery had burnt at his feet, and relying too raffily upon 
the plenitude of his power) had pronounced folemuly this 
T II O O D. 
awful fentence : « The Wife of Braganza has ceafed to 
reign.” Doubly fledged with thefe words, his young ea¬ 
gles had taken flight, and alighted near the battlements of 
Liffion. The prince of Brazil, the regent of Portugal, 
deprived accidentally of ftrength fufficient to oppofe the 
enemy, took counfel of his belt friends, applied to his an¬ 
cient and faithful ally the king of England, and deter¬ 
mined to leave a country, naturally unable to defend her- 
felf, to the protection of a ftronger arm, and to feek, 
acrofs the Atlantic, a place of repole and happinefs, out of 
the reach of the inlatiable ufurper. 
It teems as if the genius of Lufitania, as Camoens 
would have reprefented him, hovering over the troubled 
waves of the Tagus, and covering Lilbon with his pro¬ 
tective wings, had at that moment cried aloud with the 
poet: 
Vis, quibus ejl Virtus, muliebrem tollite luElurn ; 
Etrvfca prater et volate littora. 
Nos manct Oceanus circumvagus ; Arva , bcata 
Pctamus arva, divites et injulas. 
Jupiter ilia pice fecrevit littora genti 
Ut inquinavit cere tempus aureum. Hor. Ep. 16. 
O ye, whom virtue warms, indulge no more 
Thefe female plaints, but quit this fated (hore; 
For earth-furrounding fea your flights awaits 
Olf’ring its blifsful iiles and happy feats.— 
When brafs had ltain’d the golden age with crimes, 
Jove for the juft relerv’d thele peaceful climes. Francis. 
The bold refolve had its full effeCl. Conveyed under 
the fovereign flag of Britannia, the court of Liffion, 
followed by all thofe whole affedlion to the Lufitanian 
conllitutions had made the intereft of the prefumptive 
heir of the crown their own, embarked under the mod 
propitious aufpices, failed to the weft, and, like the bold 
and unenflaved Phocseans of old, to whom Horace alludes 
in the paflage quoted above, left far behind their native 
cities, and trailed themfelves to the ocean. A confider- 
able part of another hemifphere, which they had hitherto 
ruled with diftant fway, greeted the arrival of perfonal 
majelty, and rejoiced at the landing of their felf-exiled re¬ 
gent. They, with unfeigned acclamations of joy, hailed 
the happy day, the fortunate hour, when they kneeled as 
ufual at the feet of their beloved prince; and forelaw that 
fuch acolony might be,a few years hence, perhaps acentury, 
the focus of light, the ffielter of the mules, the manfion of 
locial liberty, in the new world ; whilft the old hemifphere, 
over-run by ambitious monopoly and tyranny, will dwin¬ 
dle into darknefs and barbarifm, and retain nothing of its 
ancient fplendour but its name and the lhame of being no 
longer what it had been. 
Penetrated with jult gratitude for the fervices, which, 
under the direflion of the Britilli government, he had re¬ 
ceived from feveral generals and officers in the Britilli 
navy and army, his royal highnefs the prince of Brafil, 
prince regent of Portugal, inllituted the Order of the Tower 
and Sword in the year 18085 “to ferve as a lading memo* 
rial of the refolution by which he preferved his crown, 
and to commemorate the fidelity of his fubje< 5 ts and the 
liability of his alliance with England.” Thele are the very 
words which his royal highnefs the prince regent of Por¬ 
tugal made ule of in his diploma to Francis Brian Hill, 
elq. fecretary of legation from the conrt of St. James’s 
at the court of Rio-Janeiro, to receive the order, and to 
wear, with the permillion of the king of England, the in¬ 
fignia, of the Tower and Sword. A noble inllitution, 
which has for its balls a religious fenfe of gratitude to the 
Almighty, moll properly mixed with paternal feelings for 
the Portuguefe fubjects, and a generous confcioulnefs of 
obligation to Great Britain. 
The badge is of gold, and confills of a liar of eight rays 
upon a circle of the fame metal. The centre on one fide 
bears the profile of the prince regent, furrounded with the 
words, Joa’o. d. g. reg. de. port, principe, do. era- 
Sip. 
