The Manual of Heraldry

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The chief has a diminutive called a fillet; it must never be more than one fourth the breadth of the chief.

Ex. Or, a chief, purpure, in the lower part a fillet, azure.

This ordinary may be charged with a variety of figures, which are always named after the tincture of the chief.

It may be necessary to inform the reader that, in describing a coat of arms, the general color of the shield or the field is first described, then the honorable ordinaries, their tinctures, then the object with which they are charged. We shall have to remark more particularly on the order of describing ordinaries, tinctures, and charges on coats of arms, when we treat of the rules of heraldry; but the student might have been confused if this brief direction had been omitted, as we shall have to describe every shield of arms in the same order.

The pale is an honorable ordinary, consisting of two perpendicular lines drawn from the top to the base of the escutcheon, and contains one third of the width of the field.

Ex. Azure, a pale, or.