On the other side of the Brown Gallery are Lady Betty Germaine’s Bed-room and Dressing-room: here, also, are fire-dogs, cabinets, and easy-chairs, that time has made picturesque. Lady Betty Germaine, from whom this room is named, was a great patroness of literature and the Arts. She was daughter of the Earl of Berkeley, and second wife to Sir John Germaine. Dying without issue, she left, as did her husband, an immense property to her nephew, Lord George Sackville, who assumed the name of Germaine. After his disgrace for alleged military incompetency in the reign of George II., he was loaded with honours by George III., and by him created Viscount Sackville and Baron Bolebrooke. Lady Betty, by her will, bequeathed to Lady Vere £20,000; to Lord George Sackville £20,000, and Drayton House and estate; and, after other legacies, left the residue of her property to be equally divided between them. Here, too, is the Spangled Bed-room, which owes its name to the character of its draperies. The Billiard-room is then reached, and then the Leicester Gallery, the most interesting of the whole range: it is full of portraits of the highest merit by great masters—that of the poet-Earl of Surrey being among its chief attractions. Leading from this gallery is the Venetian Bed-room with its Dressing-room; between them hangs a portrait of the Venetian ambassador, who gave the gallery its name—Nicolo Molino. The looking-glass in this apartment repays careful attention. It is framed in ebony, banded with silver; and in this and similar articles of furniture the examples afforded of a free, bold style of silver-work, English in its character, and eminently adapted to show to advantage the lustrous surface of the noble metal, are very striking. In some of the vases and sconces, of which copies are now to be seen at South Kensington, the same class of workmanship may be studied.
Lovers of heraldic antiquity will look with respectful affection at the pedigree of the noble family, a ponderous roll of parchment, fixed in a frame, as on the roller of a blind, so that it can be drawn out for consultation. The arms blazoned on the portion visible are those borne in 1586. Close by is a second roll of equal length, but of narrower width, which appears to contain drawings of tombs and monuments, and copies of painted windows, illustrative of the pedigree.
The Cartoon Gallery.
The Cartoon Gallery—so called as containing copies in oil by Mytens of six of the cartoons of Raffaelle—is also full of historic portraits. In this room are some remarkably fine fire-dogs. Two of these interesting objects from the Cartoon Gallery are engraved on our initial letter on page 56.
The King’s Room, the room in which it is said, though without any direct evidence, that James I. slept when a guest at Knole, is lined with tapestry detailing the story of Nebuchadnezzar; the hangings of the bed are thickly “inlaid” with silver—it is tissue of the costliest kind; a mirror of silver, an Art specimen of the rarest order; the various articles of the toilet in the same metal; two marvellous ebony cabinets; and other objects of great worth, account for the expenditure said to have been incidental to the visit of the sovereign: it is added that as they were there placed and arranged in the first years of the seventeenth century they have remained ever since. It is probable that the furniture of this room is what was prepared for the King at the grand reception given to him at Oxford by the Duke, and afterwards brought to Knole. Knole has not, however, been without its royal visitors, as we have already stated: among them were Henry VII., Henry VIII., and Queen Elizabeth.
The King’s Bed-room.
The Dining-room contains the portraits of men made famous by genius rather than rank. Here are Shakspere, Beaumont, Fletcher, Chaucer, Congreve, Gay, Rowe, Garth, Cowley, Swift, Otway, Pope, Milton, Addison, Waller, Dryden, Hobbes, Newton, Locke (the six last named by Kneller), Goldsmith, Dr. Johnson, Garrick (marvellous paintings by Sir Joshua Reynolds), Walter Scott, and other heroes of the pen, many of whom were honoured visitors at Knole during their lives, and have been reverenced there since they left earth.
The Staircase at the Grand Entrance is singular and interesting: parts of it are old, but the decorative portions are of a modern, and not of a good character.