Note 6 — Chapter VII
Reading edition
: One Jervis, the principal founder of Exbridge, in Devon, bore six ostrich feathers, and in the heraldry of to-day they are occasionally met with as charges. The Fetherstons bear three ostrich feathers on their shield, and the Earl of Devon has seven ostrich feathers in his crest.
We are all familiar with the Prince of Wales's plumes, but to go farther back into history, we find that a plume of ostrich feathers was often used by King Stephen as his badge, with the motto of his own making: "Vi nulla invertitur ordo"—"No force alters their fashion"—in allusion to the "fold fall of the feather," which was neither shaken nor disordered by the wind, and therefore symbolized the condition of well-ordered kings and kingdoms.
In bygone times, we are told, "some doubted whether an ostrich should be reckoned as a beast or a fowl"!