Note 548 — PREFACE (continued 4)

The Order of St. Michael was instituted by Louis XI., King of France, in 1469. The number of Knights was limited to thirty-six. It received the name of the Cockle, from the escalop-shells of gold with which the collar of the Order was ornamented.—In September 1548, is this payment by the Treasurer, "Item, for paintting of my Lord Governoures armes setting furth of the Collar that day that my Lord of Angus and Argyle had ressavit the Ordour, xlv s." From the date, we might have concluded that this referred to the Order of the Cockle, had it not been that three years previously mention is made, in a letter from one of the English "espialles," in Scotland, (communicated to Lord Wharton, on the 12th June 1545,) that "the Order of the Cocle," with a collar of gold, had then been sent from France to the Earl of Angus.—(State Papers, vol. v. p. 460.)