It shall be covered with velvet red,
And cloths of fine gold all about your head,
With damask white and azure blue,
Well diapered with lilies new
Your pomelles (knobs) shall be ended with gold,
Your chains enamelled many a fold.
The oldest kind of wheel-carriages known in England were called whirlecotes, and one of these belonged to the mother of Richard the second. Whirlecotes were used also at the marriage of Katherine of Arragon. Coaches were probably first introduced from Hungary. They seem to have been square, not differing greatly in outline from the state coaches of which numerous engraved plates can be seen; and were considered as too effeminate a conveyance for men in the days of Elizabeth. The coach of Henry the fourth of France may be studied in the plate by Van Luyken that represents his murder by Ravaillac, 1610. It is four-wheeled, square, with a flat awning on four corner pillars or supports, and curtains. The centre descends into a kind of boot with leather sides. The accompanying woodcut represents the carriage of the English ambassador at Rome in 1688: and we add also an engraving of a state carriage of about fifty years later, still in the possession of Lord Darnley.
