Part 10 (1/2)

The flag of Servia, another small kingdom of Eastern Europe, is shown in Fig. 243; the royal standard is similar, except that the arms are placed in the centre of the blue stripe. It will be seen that the flag of Servia is that of Russia, Fig. 218, reversed. By the Berlin Treaty of 1878, Servia received a large increase of territory, and was created an independent State, its princely ruler being crowned king in March, 1882.

The State of Bulgaria is another of the creations of the Berlin Treaty. It is governed by a prince who is nominally under the suzerainty of Turkey.

Its war flag is shown in Fig. 241; the mercantile flag has no leonine canton, but is simply a tricolor of white, green, and red.

Having already dealt with the United States, we propose now to turn our attention to the other Governments of the New World. The simple and effective ensign of Chili is represented in Fig. 161. This flag is used both by the Chilian men-of-war and by the vessels of the mercantile marine.

Fig. 157 is so much of the pendant of a man-of-war as the limits of our page will permit. The Chilian Jack is the blue canton and white star of Fig. 161, treated as a distinct {122} flag, and the flags of the various naval ranks are also blue with a varying number of white stars.

Fig. 164 is the merchant flag of New Granada; the Government ensign has in addition the s.h.i.+eld of arms in the centre of the blue stripe. It will be observed that the colours in this tricolor are the same as those of Roumania, Fig. 242, only differently disposed. New Granada is composed of nine small States, and in 1863 these bound themselves into a closer confederation, and changed their collective name from New Granada to that of the United States of Colombia, and adopted a tricolor of yellow, blue, and red, only disposed horizontally instead of as in Fig. 164, vertically.

This sounds identical with the flag of Venezuela, but in the centre of the Colombian flag is placed a different device, and the yellow stripe takes up half the s.p.a.ce, the other two being only half its width. Fig. 165 is the flag of Uruguay, a State that was formerly a province of Brazil, but declared its independence in the year 1825. The next flag on our plate, Fig. 166, is the war ensign of Guatemala: the s.h.i.+eld in the centre bears a scroll with the words ”Libertad 15 de Setiembre, 1821,” surmounted by a parrot, surrounded by a wreath, and having behind it crossed rifles and swords. The merchant flag is the plain blue, white, blue, without the s.h.i.+eld. In the year 1525 the country was conquered by Don Pedro de Alvarado, one of the companions of Cortes, and it remained subject to Spain until 1821, when it gained its independence, the ”Libertad” of the scroll.

It then went in vigorously for several years of civil war, and the outcome of this was that the country known under Spanish rule as Guatemala, a country embracing all Central America, split up in 1839 into five Republics, all absolutely independent of each other, viz., Guatemala, San Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua, and Costa Rica.

The next flag, Fig. 167, is the ensign of Costa Rica: the one represented is that of the Merchant Service. The war ensign differs from it in having in the centre the arms of the State, surrounded on either side by a trophy of three flags, and beneath all a wreath. Fig. 168, the flag of Paraguay, is very suggestive of the colours of Holland, though the device in the centre serves to differentiate it. Paraguay is the only State in America that has no sea-board, and therefore no Mercantile Marine.

Brazil, discovered by the Portuguese in 1500, remained in their possession until a revolutionary struggle in the year 1821 ended in favour of the Brazilians, when an Empire was shortly afterwards established. Compared to the other States of South America, it has pa.s.sed through long periods of rest and prosperity, but of late years its political position has been one of considerable uncertainty, the Emperor having been dismissed and the rival {123} ambitions for the Presidents.h.i.+p leading to civil war. These political changes have necessarily produced modifications in the flag. The present flag, Fig. 169, is not altogether unlike that of the late Empire, though in this latter case the yellow diamond on the green ground held a s.h.i.+eld and Imperial crown, flanked by sprays of coffee and tobacco. In the present flag this yellow diamond has a blue sphere spotted over with stars and a white band running across it, that bears in blue letters the legend _Ordem e progresso_.[81] Fig. 173 is the upper portion of the man-of-war pendant, a blue ground with white stars. Fig. 169 is the ensign, both of the War and Merchant Navy of Brazil.

The yellow, blue, and red tricolor, Fig. 170, is the merchant ensign of Venezuela; the war flag has the same stripes, and in addition the s.h.i.+eld of the arms of the State is placed on the yellow band at the staff corner.

When the Spaniards arrived off the coast in the year 1499, they found on landing that some of the native Indians were living in huts built on piles, hence they called the country Venezuela, or little Venice.

Bolivia, formerly comprised in the Spanish Vice-Royalty of Colombia, derives its present name from Simon Bolivar, the leader of the revolution that gained it its freedom. Its commercial flag is shown in Fig. 171; the war flag only differs in having the arms of the State placed in the centre of the red strip.

The familiar green, white, red of Italy is repeated in the flag of Mexico, but instead of the cross of Savoy, we have the eagle and serpent. The Mexican merchant ensign is the plain tricolor of green, white, red, the central device we see in Fig. 172 marking it as the war flag. Mexico was discovered in 1518, and conquered, with infamous cruelties, by Cortes.

After a lengthened revolutionary struggle, the yoke of Spain was finally thrown off in 1829, and the independence of Mexico was recognised by all the great European Powers.

Peru was discovered by the Spaniards in 1513, and was soon afterwards, under the command of Pizarro, added to the dominions of the King of Spain.

Peru remained in subjection to the Spaniards (who murdered the Incas and all their descendants, and committed the most frightful cruelties) until 1826, when the independence of the country, after a prolonged struggle, was completely achieved. The Peruvian war ensign is given in Fig. 174, the merchant flag being the plain red, white, red.

San Salvador, the smallest of the Central American Republics, {124} established itself in 1839, on the break-up of the Spanish State of Guatemala. Its flag is shown in Fig. 175.

The country now held by the Argentine Republic was discovered in 1517, and settled by the Spaniards in 1553. The war ensign is represented in Fig.

176; the merchant ensign has the three stripes, but the golden sun is missing.

The Government of Ecuador has Fig. 177 as its war flag, the merchant ensign being without the ring of white stars. The last flag on the sheet (Fig.

178) is the merchant flag of Haiti; the Government flag has the blue and red reduced to a broad border, the central portion of the flag being white.

In the centre of this white portion stands a palm tree, and below it a trophy of arms and flags, flanked on either side by a cannon.

The flag of the Cuban national forces in conflict with Spain has at the hoist a triangular portion of blue, one side of this triangle being the depth of the flag itself, and on this blue field is a white, five-pointed star. The rest of the flag is made up of the following horizontal and equal stripes--red, white, red, white, red.

j.a.pan--known to the j.a.panese as Niphon, derived from _Nitsu_, Sun, and _Phon_, the rising--the Land of the Rising Sun,[82] has adopted this rising sun as its emblem. j.a.pan claims to possess a written history of over 2,500 years, but the fairly authentic portion begins with the year 660 B.C., when the present hereditary succession of rulers commenced. English merchants visited j.a.pan in 1612, and the Portuguese almost a century before. By 1587 the converts of the Portuguese Jesuit Missions numbered some six hundred thousand. At this time some Spanish Franciscans appeared on the scene, and political and religious discord soon followed. The j.a.panese ruler took alarm at the Papal claim to universal sovereignty, and the Buddhist Priesthood and the English and Dutch Protestant traders fanned the flame of suspicion and jealousy. This was done so effectually that the j.a.panese Government banished all foreigners, and closed the country against them.

This state of things lasted for over two centuries, and it was only in the year 1853 that j.a.pan was re-opened to the outside world. The flag of j.a.pan, the rising sun, is represented in Fig. 244. The red ball without the rays is used as a Jack, in which case it is placed in the centre of the white field. Fig. 245 is the Standard of the Emperor. The chrysanthemum is the emblem of j.a.pan, and its golden flower, somewhat conventionally rendered it must be admitted, is the form we see introduced in Fig. 245.[83] Figs. 246 and 248 are the transport flag and the guard flag respectively of the j.a.panese war marine. {125}

The Imperial Standard of China is yellow with a blue dragon. The official flag book of the Admiralty gives the flag of a Chinese Admiral as made up of the following horizontal stripes: yellow, white, black, green, red, a blue dragon on a white ground being the canton in the staff-head corner.

The merchant ensign is shown in Fig. 247. Amongst the Chinese flags captured in 1841, and preserved in the Royal United Service Inst.i.tution, is one with a blue centre with an inscription in white upon it, and with a broad notched border of white; another has its centre of a pale blue and a darker blue dragon upon it, the whole being surrounded by a broad and deeply-notched border of red.

The flag of Siam is scarlet with a white elephant thereon. Before Xacca, the founder of the nation, was born his mother dreamt that she brought forth a white elephant, and the Brahmins affirm that Xacca, after a metempsychosis of eighty thousand changes, concluded his very varied experiences as this white elephant, and thence was received into the company of the Celestial Deities. On this account the white elephant is held a sacred beast, and the Siamese rejoice to place themselves beneath so potent a protector. The flag of Korea bears the tiger. In the thickly-wooded glens of the interior, the royal tiger is found in formidable numbers.

The flag of Sarawak, a territory of some forty thousand square miles, on the north-west of Borneo, is shown in Fig. 252. The Government was obtained in 1842 from the Sultan of Borneo by an Englishman, Sir James Brooke, and it is still ruled by one of the family, a nephew of the first Rajah.