[140] Caravelle Francaise tirée des "Ouvres Pilote du Havre," MSS. du XVI. Siecle.
[Illustration 55: FLAG OF A FRENCH CARAVEL, 16TH CENTURY.]
It is quite evident that the rectangular white border to the St. George could not be formed by a cross of this shape, and, therefore, this suggestion for the origin of the white border must be taken as erroneous.
Further, it was not unreasonable, seeing that the Royal Standard is composed of the personal arms of the sovereign, that the successive kings and queens of England should have continued the _fleur-de-lis_ in one of the quarterings of their royal arms, as a sign of family succession, and as evidence of personal claim by descent to the old sovereignty of France; but the British nations brought into union did not themselves claim any such sovereignty, Calais, the last foothold of England in France, won by Edward III. in his claim to the succession of the throne of France, having been lost in 1558 under Queen Mary. There would, therefore, be no corresponding reason for inserting the French cross in the union flag, nor any historical connection which would justify its being so used.
In the illustrations given of the two-crossed Jack of 1606 (Pl. III., fig. 2, and cut 16), the white saltire of St. Andrew is represented as of the full size of a wide saltire cross; so also in the Jack of Queen Anne, 1707 (Pl. V., fig. 1), in which the broad white of St. George was first given its full width.
This is the proportion of size which is given to it in heraldic drawings, and the way in which it is usually drawn in later representations, the white saltire cross of St. Andrew being thus shown broader than the white border to St. George; but the earlier practice in the actual making of flags appears to have been different.
In the allotment of the proportions in the new three-crossed Jack of 1801, when the cross of St. Patrick was added to the flag, it has been pointed out that the white border to St. George was continued in its full width, as in the previous flag of 1707, and was given the same width as each of the two national crosses, which were then first placed side by side, and between which the saltire space was then divided.
It will be interesting to show, by reference to early original documents and flags, that this was the same equality as had previously existed between the cross of St. Andrew and the border of St. George in the old two-crossed Jacks of James I. and of Queen Anne.