Some idea of what the rooms were like which surrounded a courtyard of the time may be gathered from the description of the suite allotted to the Earl of Lincoln when he went to Cassell, in 1596, on an embassage to the Landgrave of Hesse; and although they were in a German castle the description would apply almost equally well to those in a large English house. The rooms were five in number, and they occupied the end of a goodly quadrangle, like the Louvre at Paris, high and stately.[23] They consisted of two dining chambers, two drawing chambers, and between the two latter a bed chamber, so placed "for his more quiet and private being." His lordship's own dining chamber was panelled with wood and marble, "with crestings, indentments, and Italian pillar work;" there were escutcheons with the blazoned arms of the Landgrave's "friends and allies of the Protestant part," and on the four sides of the room next the ceiling were carved four stories of the Creation, the Passion, the Resurrection, and the Judgment; the ceiling was wrought with knot-work. The next room, where the ambassador's gentlemen dined, was hung with tapestry. The next "was a fair drawing chamber, seated round about, and covered with scarlet; above the seats hung round with a rich small wrought tapestry of an ell broad, of emblem work, and verses written underneath; over this, upon a ledge of wainscot, were divers tables [pictures] of sundry devices, well painted, with their posies to garnish the chamber, and, among all, that was the best which had this motto: 'Major autem horum est caritas,' for it waxed cold. The roof was likewise flourished with painting and devices. These rooms had the through light of four fair windows." The bedroom was decorated with a painted tree that grew up at the door, the branches spreading all over the ceiling, full of fruit, and hanging down upon the walls, with other pictures to fill up empty places; the story taken out of Daniel. The last room of the suite was "a fair drawing chamber hung with arras, which parted his Honour's lodging from the other side of the house, that so he might not any way be disturbed." We get therefore in this set of rooms an example of the three principal modes of decorating the walls—by panelling, by hanging with tapestry or arras, and (more seldom) by painting. At Theobalds the hall was decorated with trees, and not only were they furnished with leaves and fruit, but, regardless of the niceties of natural history, with birds' nests too, and so lifelike was the effect that, according to the testimony of a German visitor in 1592,[24] when the steward opened the windows the birds flew in, perched upon the trees, and began to sing—perhaps to express their surprise at finding fruit and nests on the trees at the same time. This realistic treatment was, fortunately, not very common, and it is rather curious that so strong a man as Lord Burghley should have delighted in such embellishments, and others equally puerile in conception.
[23]Nichols' Progresses of Queen Elizabeth, Vol. II.
[24]The Secretary of Frederick, Duke of Wirtemberg. England as seen by Foreigners in the days of Elizabeth and James I., by W. B. Rye, p. 44.
The more usual way of treating the walls was to cover them either with hangings or with panelling. There are numberless references to the former among the poets of the time. Imogen's bedchamber was "hanged with tapestry of silk and silver"; Falstaff fell asleep behind the arras when he took his ease in his inn, and had his pocket picked; Polonius, when he hid himself in order to overhear Hamlet's interview with his mother, slipped behind the arras, and it was through the arras that Hamlet subsequently made the fatal pass with his sword. The rooms in Spencer's Castle Joyous "were round about apparelled with costly cloths of Arras and of Tours," and the parlour of Alma's castle "was with royal arras richly dight." These hangings were moved from house to house when the family migrated from one abode to another, and in Beaumont and Fletcher's Wit without Money there is a lively scene in which a great lady suddenly determines to leave her house in town for the country. Amid the confusion which ensues—servants shouting, my lady's sister in much anxiety about her dog, her looking-glass, and her curls—Ralph calls to Roger to help down with the hangings, but Roger declines, as he is unable to leave the packing of his trunks. The hangings at Hampton Court were of the most costly description,[25] Cardinal Wolsey being an ardent collector, and utilizing the services of his agents in various foreign countries to add to his stores. Three-quarters of a century later much of this splendour was still left, and the German visitor whom we have already seen at Theobalds says of Hampton Court, that "all the apartments and rooms in this immensely large structure are hung with rich tapestry, of pure gold and fine silk."[26] From this regal magnificence there were numberless gradations down to the "smirch'd, worm-eaten tapestry" mentioned in that conversation between Borachio and Conrade which led to their arrest by Dogberry. The subjects of these hangings were of extreme diversity—scriptural, mythological, and allegorical. There were the stories of Toby, Our Lady, and the Forlorn Son, alongside of those of Priamus, Venus and Cupid, and Hannibal. The story of Esther balanced the Romaunt of the Rose. Christian saints and heathen gods were equally welcome, and always and everywhere, either in foliated borders or forming the subject-matter itself, were the arms of the owner, with angels or amorini to support them, and a convoluted scroll to bear the motto. The allegorical subjects are the most bewildering, and they even puzzled the people of the time, to whom such trains of thought were familiar, for it is expressly said of the tapestry in Alma's parlour that in it there was nothing portrayed nor wrought but what was easy to understand. Of course much of the tapestry which was so widely used has now disappeared, or has found its way into the hands of collectors; very little is left in its original positions, even if it remains in the houses for which it was first acquired. There is a fair amount, however, to be found up and down the country, and the effect of tapestry-hung walls in conjunction with a rich plaster ceiling is shown in Fig. [134], from a bedroom in Deene Hall, Northamptonshire.
[25]Law, Vol. I., p. 57.
[26]England as seen by Foreigners, p. 18.
134.—Bedroom in Deene Hall, Northamptonshire. Plaster Ceiling: Tapestry on Walls.
Wood Panelling.
Wood panelling is of a more permanent character than tapestry, or at least is not so easily removed and adapted to fresh situations; and there are many examples left of this mode of clothing and decorating the walls of houses and churches. It was in vogue tolerably early in the century, and there is a contract, printed in the History of Hengrave, between Sir Thomas Kytson, for whom the house was built, and Thomas Neker, for "seelyng" the house. This "seelyng" has been mistaken for plastering, but a perusal of the contract shows that it must have been panelling, since some of the rooms are to be "seelyd" their whole height, and others only to the height of the windows, or a certain number of feet high. Stools, benches, cupboards, and portals are also mentioned as part of the work, as well as "the gates at the coming in"; and Sir Thomas is to find all manner of timber, hewn and sawn. Among the rooms to be thus panelled were the hall, the two parlours, the wardrobe over the cellar, and the two great chambers above the daïs. Seven lodgings, that is bedchambers, were to have portals only; sixteen other lodgings were to be "seelyd" to the pendant's foot, and on the pastry house a wardrobe was to be made, with one close press, and open presses round about. There was to be a fret on the ceiling of the hall with hanging pendants, "vault fashion"; no doubt after the manner of the watching chamber at Hampton Court, which was being built about the same time. Towards these works Sir Thomas Kytson was to provide the contractor with "all the old seelyng, and frets of the old work that is in his keeping."