succeed),
motto of the families Manners and Manners-Sutton. This ring was owned
by Sir Walter Scott, and at the dispersal sale of his personal effects
at Abbots-ford it was acquired by the late Samuel Latham Mitchell
Barlow, the great art connoisseur and collector, by whose son, Judge
Peter T. Barlow, of New York, it has been inherited, in whose
possession it now is, and through whose courtesy it is here reproduced.
Many
interesting facts in regard to the history of the diamond engraved for
Queen Henrietta Maria, wife of Charles I, have been presented by Mr. C.
Drury Fortnum, who purchased the diamond from the collection of the
Duke of Brunswick in 1879.78 In the catalogue of the Duke's
collection this stone is described as the signet of Mary, Queen of
Scots, an attribution which had been current for many years ; but Mr.
Fortnum has shown that the initials on the diamond should be read MR,
the cross-bar in the first character representing the letter H, and the
whole signifying Maria Henrietta Regina.
Fortunately
we have the original of the treasury order given by Charles I, under
date of January 16, 1629, directing the payment of a sum of money to
the engraver for his work. As this is probably the only case in which
the original record of payment for engraving an historical diamond has
been preserved, it is reproduced here from Mr. Fortnum's paper in
Archeologia.80
Charles by the grace of God King of England, Scotland, France, and Ireland, Defender of the Faith, &c.
79 See Archeologia, vol. xlvii, 393, and vol. 1, p. 114.
80 Vol.
xlvii, London, 1883, p. 393. The original document is in the privy seal
books of the Clerk of the Pells, now in the Public Record Office, No.
11, p. 142.
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