marquess, whether eldest or younger, or the eldest son of an earl is consecrated a bishop his derivative rank is not merged in his substantive rank, because it is official, and his derivative and personal rank implies the higher precedence. Again, the daughters of dukes, marquesses and earls who become peeresses by marriage or creation, or who inherit as peeresses, are placed according to their substantive and not according to their derivative rank, although they may thereby be assigned a far lower precedence than that to which their birth entitles them. 5. The widows of peers and baronets have precedence immediately before the wives or widows of the next successors in their husbands' dignities. But the sons and daughters of peers and baronets have precedence immediately before the sons and daughters of the holders of the dignities to whom their fathers succeeded. The reason of this is that the first are senior in the dignities and the second are nearer in the line of succession to them.
6. The widows of peers who marry again either share the precedence of their second husbands or resume the precedence belonging to them independently of their marriage with their first husbands. Thus, if the daughter of a duke or an esquire marries first an earl and secondly a baron, although she remains a peeress, she is placed as a baroness instead of a countess. But if either of them should marry a commoner as her second husband, whatever may be his rank or degree, she ceases to be a peeress. While, however, the duke's daughter, if her second husband were not the eldest son of a duke, would resume her precedence as the daughter of a duke, the esquire's daughter would share the precedence of her second husband, whether he were a peer's son, a baronet, a knight or an esquire. The widows of peers have long kept their former rank in society, but they have no such right unless by permission of the sovereign, which permission has on several recent occasions been refused. 7. The widows of the eldest and younger sons of dukes and marquesses and of the eldest sons of earls, and also the widows of baronets and knights who marry again, are permitted by the etiquette of society to keep the titles and rank acquired by their first marriage if their second marriage is with a commoner whose precedence is considerably lower. But the widows of the younger sons of earls and of the eldest and younger sons of viscounts and barons, although their precedence is higher than that of the widows of baronets and knights, are not allowed to retain it, under any circumstances, after a second marriage.
8. Marriage does not affect the precedence of peeresses in their own right unless their husbands are peers whose peerages are of a higher degree, or, being of the same degree, are of more ancient creation than their own. If, for example, a baroness in her own right marries a Viscount she is placed and described as a viscountess, or if she marries a baron whose barony is older than hers she is placed in his precedence and described by his title. But if she marries a baron whose barony is junior to hers she keeps her own precedence and title.
9. The daughters of peers, of sons of peers, baronets and knights retain after marriage the precedence they derive from their fathers, unless they marry peers of any rank or commoners of higher rank than their own. Hence, for example, the daughter of a duke who marries the eldest son of a marquess is placed as a duke's daughter, not as the wife of a marquess's eldest son, and the daughter of a baronet who marries the younger son of a knight is placed as a baronet's daughter and not as the wife of a knight's younger son.
ro. What are termed “ titles of courtesy ” are borne by all the sons and daughters of peers and peeresses in their own right, who in this connexion stand on exactly the same footing. The eldest sons of dukes, marquesses and earls are designated by the names of one or other of the inferior peerages of their fathers, usually a marques sate or an earldom in the first, an earldom or a viscount in the second and a viscount or barony in the third case. The rule applicable in former times, still adhered to by the older English dignities, was that a duke's eldest son was styled earl, the son of a marquess, Viscount, the son of an earl, baron. No such rule obtained in Scotland. But, whatever it may be, it is altogether without effect on the rank and place of the bearer, which are those belonging to him as the eldest son of his father. The younger sons of dukes and marquesses are styled “lords, ” followed by both their Christian names and surnames. The younger sons of earls and both the eldest and the younger sons of viscounts and barons are described as “ honourable” before both their Christian names and surnames. The daughters of dukes, marquesses and earls are styled “ladies” before both their Christian names and surnames. The daughters of viscounts and barons are described as “honourable ” before both their Christian names and surnames. If the eldest son of a marquess or an earl marries a woman of rank equal or inferior to his own, she takes his title and precedence; but if she is of superior rank she retains, with her own precedence, the prefix “lady ” before her Christian name followed by the name of her husband's title of courtesy. Again, if the younger son of a duke or a niarquess marries a woman of rank equal or inferior to his own, she is called “ lady, ” with his Christian and surname following, and is placed in his precedence, but, if she is of superior rank, she retains, with her own precedence, the prefix “ lady ” before her Christian name and his surname. If the daughter of a duke, a marquess or an earl marries the younger son of an earl, the eldest or younger son of a Viscount or baron, a baronet, a knight or an esquire, &c., she retains, with her own precedence, the prefix “ lady ” before her Christian name and her husband's surname. If the daughter of a Viscount marries the younger son of an earl or anybody of inferior rank to him, or the daughter of a baron marries the younger son of a. Viscount or anybody of inferior rank to him, she retains her own precedence with the prefix “honourable ” before the addition “ Mrs ” and his surname or Christian name and surname. But, if her husband is a baronet or a knight, she is called the Honourable Lady Smith or the Honourable Lady ]ones, as the case may be. The wives of the younger sons of earls and of the eldest and younger sons of viscounts and barons, if they are of inferior rank to their husbands, take their precedence and are described as the Honourable Mrs, with the surnames or Christian names and surnames of their husbands following. The judges were placed by James I. before the younger sons of viscounts and barons and accorded the title of “ honourable ” (q.'v.). But in this addition their wives do not participate, since it is merely an official distinction. - .
It is manifest on even a cursory examination of the tables we have given that, although they embody the only scheme of general precedence, whether for men or for women, which is authoritatively sanctioned. or recognized, they are in many respects very imperfectly fitted to meet the circumstances and requirements of the present day? In both of them the limits prescribed to the royal family are pedantically and inconveniently narrow, and stand out in striking contrast to the wide and ample bounds through which the operation of the Royal Marriage Act (12 Geo. III. c. II) extends the disabilities but not the privileges of the sovereign's kindred. Otherwise the scale of general precedence for women compares favourably enough with 1 “ There are no doubt certain public ceremonials of State, such as Coronations, Royal Public Funerals and Processions of the Sovereign to Parliament, &c., wherein various public functionaries walk and have for the occasion certain places assigned to them, but which they may not at all times find the same, as it by, no means follows that they are always entitled to the same place for having been there once: there is to a certairrextent a precedent furnished thereby, and in some cases the uniformity of precedence in regard to one class over another has in such cases become established. This applies, for instance, to the places of the Gentlemen of the Privy Chamber, Law Officers of the Crown and Masters and Six Clerks in Chancery, who have no definite or fixed place in the tables of precedence regulating the, general orders of society, though in reference to State ceremonials they have certain places assigned in the order of procession in right of their offices, which, however, give them no general rank. Upon such occasions, nevertheless, the legal rank and precedence which they hold in the Courts of Law is observed, and so far establishes among themselves, and in respect to their several classes, their precedence ” (Sir Charles Young, Order of Precedence, &c., pp. 59-61).
