You must use your own eyes, and judge for yourself. I will tell you, however, all that I know as briefly as possible, and point out whatever occurs to me in our scamper, for a scamper it can only be termed: just such a kind of run as a person makes through London who has come up by railroad to see all its wonders in a week. But I cannot allow you to examine so closely that curiously
carved oak chimney-piece in the inner hall, although I admit that it may be as early as Henry VIII.’s time, and those interesting old portraits. Where shall we begin? You wish to inspect everything. Suppose, then, we commence with the kitchen, and steam it up-stairs to the dormitories, going at the rate of a high-pressure engine.
You are already aware that the kitchen was panelled with oak from the drawing-room of Winchester House, and now you see the whole style of fitting-up accords with that of “bygone days.” Look, for instance, towards the kitchen window, and you will find that the various cupboards, presses and dressers—even the cooking utensils—correspond; but, although modern improvements have not been lost sight of, antique forms have been retained. Let one example suffice, that of an ancient gridiron, of beautiful and elaborate workmanship.
The history of the plates and dishes displayed in this
kitchen would afford an opportunity for a dissertation on the rise and progress of the fine arts in this country, as they present most curious and important specimens of early drawing, painting, and poetry. The old English plate was a square piece of wood, which indeed is not quite obsolete at the present hour. The improvement upon this primitive plate was a circular platter, with a raised edge; but there were also thin, circular, flat plates of beech-wood in use for the dessert or confection, and they were gilt and painted upon one side, and inscribed with pious, or instructive, or amorous mottoes, suited to the taste of the society in which they were produced. Such circular plates are now well known to antiquaries under the name of “roundels,” and were at one time generally supposed by them to have been used as cards for fortune-telling, or playing with at questions and answers. More sober research into their origin and use shows that they were painted and decorated with conventional patterns by nuns, who left blank spaces for the mottoes, to be supplied by the more learned monks; and a set of these roundels generally consisted of twelve. As specimens of the style of these mottoes about the time of Henry VII. or VIII. the following may be taken:—
“Wheresoever thou traveleste,
Este, Weste, Northe, or Southe,
Learne never to looke
A geven horsse in the mouthe.”
“In friends ther ys flattery,
In men lyttell trust,
Thoughe fayre they proffer
They be offten unjuste.”
There are many sets of verses for roundels extant in
manuscript, and a few have been printed; indeed, it appears likely that to the love for this species of composition we owe Tusser’s “Five Hundred Points of Good Husbandry,” and most of his other admonitory verses.