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King of Denmark, recommended by Sir Henry Wotton , was employed atthis manufactory; “ and gave designs, both in history and grotesque,which carried those works to singular perfection.”* The splendidhangings at St. James’s Palace , so ably described by the Sieur de laSerre, in his account of the visit of Mary de Medicis, were from thelooms at Mortlake. Some few specimens are yet remaining; but thebest were purchased, with others belonging to Hampton Court andWhitehall, by Oliver Cromwell , at the sale of King Charles’s effects.One set of hangings, relating to the story of Abraham, in eight parts, atHampton Court , was valued in the inventory at 8260/.; and another inten parts, the history of Julius Caesar , was appraised at 5019/. t In 1759Zuccarelli painted a set of designs for tapestry, which were executed byPaul Saunders, yeoman arras weaver and arras tailor to the king.;}; Theywere wrought for the Earl of Egremont, to decorate some part of thehouse which he built in Piccadilly; and were about the last that weremade in this country.

JflOOt'S were generally covered with rushes, carpets being little usedfor such purposes even at the close of Elizabeth’s reign, althoughinstances occur of tapestry cloths for the feet to rest upon as early asEdward I. It does not, indeed, appear to have been the custom at. anytime to leave floors bare, whether boarded or paved; our poets, andparticularly Shakspeare, all speak of rushes and other vegetable sub-stances being strewed in the principal apartments :

“ Sll fwbcs anti flofnres, fraguant, fayrr, anti sfocte,

SjEJtre strafcuctj tn fjallcs, anti lanti uniter tfjrnr feu.”

Lyfe of Saynt Wyburge.

t Pyne’s History of the Royal Residences.J Edwards’s Anec. Painting.

* Walpole’s Anec. Painting.