preface.

I N whatsoever light considered, whether as part of the Insti-tutions of the Country, as containing in their History manyinteresting facts, or as being the Reward of those Services bywhich the military Renown of Great Britain has been estab-lished, The Orders of Knighthood of the British Empireare undoubtedly entitled to attention.

It is very remarkable, that no general History of the BritishOrders should have hitherto appeared, when books especiallyaddressed to almost every class of Society, and illustrative ofnearly all other Constitutional subjects, are continually issuingfrom the press. This fact must seem still more extraordinarywhen it is remembered, that besides any intrinsic value whichmight belong to a work of this description, it could scarcely failto interest, in the highest degree, not only such persons as hadbeen distinguished by marks of their Sovereign’s favour, buttheir families and friends, to whom it would be a perpetualmemorial of those relatives whose services and characterreflect honour upon their name.