Armand’s First Letter. Amelia’s First Letter.

14 September 1019
13 Norwich Street, Yorke

My dear cousin Amelia,

I have spent the past two weeks afflicted by haberdashers. Why didn’t you warn me of this when you had the opportunity?

I brought my best things from Mont-Havre, including my grand-master’s chain, confident that I would be ready for my presentation to His Majesty; only to find when I arrive that it was not so, not at all.

The chain is all very well, mind you; and I am informed that the rest of the outfit would have been “adequate, if barely” for any normal meeting. But it seems that as I am to be knighted there are special concerns. It is as though His Majesty’s eyes are too weak to be confronted with any kind of ordinary clothing.

No, I must wear appropriate court attire: white shirt, 1; gold cufflinks, 1 pair; court jacket, black, one; satin neck cloth, one; satin knee pants, black, 1 pair; silk stockings, white, 1 pair; court shoes, 1 pair; gold buckles for court shoes, 1 pair; sword belt, 1; scabbard, 1; sword, to be presented to me by His Majesty, 1; badge, emblazoned with coat of arms, 1.

And all of this, except for the last three items, at my own expense.

I must not give the wrong impression, however; it is not merely haberdashers. I have also been encumbered by Lord Gilroy, the Oaken King of Arms of the Royal College of Heralds. It seems that I am to be made a Knight of the Oak; and as a Knight of the Oak I must have my own coat of arms; and my coat of arms must follow a great many rules, the least of which is that it must be easily distinguishable from all other coats of arms. But it is also the first such blazon to be established for His Majesty’s Realm of Armorica, and so requires special consideration.

As the badge, the sword, and the scabbard must be properly emblazoned, it is they that have occasioned the greater part of my nightmare.

You might think that I have had a role to play in this, that I have choices to make: a preferred color, perhaps, or a preferred symbol; but this is not the case. Lord Gilroy made all of those choices himself long before I arrived in Yorke. My arms are officially described as “a bronzewood tree, or, on a field azure“, conveying my future status as Sir Armand of Bois-de-Bas.

The badge, the sword, and the scabbard are, in truth, not my affair; I do not need to be fitted or measured for them. His Majesty will use the sword to knight me, after which I will be caparisoned (I am told this is the proper term) with the badge, the belt, the scabbard, and the sword.

The difficulty has been that Lord Gilroy is an explainer. It is not enough that he should show me the badge, no. He must explain his choice of symbols and colors. He must speak to me of the history of heraldry. He must drone on about what it means to be armigerous, and the rights and responsibilities thereof, and how one might tell Armorican arms from Cumbrian at a glance—a great thing, it seems, as it greatly widens the College’s options when designing new coats of arms.

But most importantly—important, that is, to him, though not to me—he must explain to me the rules for displaying my coat of arms: where, and when, and how, and most especially where not, when not, and how not.

“For a coat of arms is a sacred trust! Yes, a sacred trust!” he has said to me over and over again. “And as the first armiger of Armorica you bear a grave responsibility, for you must be an exemplar to all who follow you.”

Under no circumstances, it seems, is a coat of arms to be associated with a mercantile concern. Lord Gilroy is aware that I consort with merchants and indeed am engaged in trade of a sort; and under no circumstances may I associate the Bois-de-Bas arms with Tuppenny Wagons. I may display them on my carriage; and he hopes that I will choose a reputable carriage-maker.

He has been most vehement about this, and returned to it several times, though it is clear that it pains him to speak of such things—he speaks with the air of one grimacing while holding some unclean thing at arm’s length between finger and thumb.

It would only be appropriate and fitting, it is clear, if I should now dissociate myself from the wagon-works, procure for myself a small estate (for I am but a provincial after all) and subsequently do my best to live as though to the manor born.

I wonder how he shall feel when Tuppenny Wagons begins selling carriages to the elite of Cumbrian? A sublime thought, indeed, and one that warms the cockles of my heart.

I do thank you for allowing me to rant, dear cousin; for I have yet another meeting with him tomorrow, and though I have not yet explained to him how insulting he is it has been a near run thing.

“He is a fool, and un petit homme, n’est-ce pas?” Amelie said to me this morning. “He should come to Bois-de-Bas; the men would dunk him in the hot-springs.”

I shall never see him again after tomorrow; I must endeavor to hold my peace, though I burst. I shall also hold the image of him rising from the hot water, coughing and spluttering, in my head the whole time I am with him; perhaps that will help.

Your much beset cousin,

Armand

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