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amusements, and conversation. The walls were chiefly indebted fortheir embellishment to a multitude of royal and family portraits,

(“ In peaked hoods and mantles tarnished,

Sour visages enough to scare ye,

High dames of honour, once, that graced

The drawing-room of fierce Queen Mary.”— Gray’s Long Story.)

painted on boards, in carved frames of walnut or cherry-tree; maps, andtables “ of the owner’s arms, and genealogical tree.” Where a long trainof ancestors could be boasted, the latter was emblazoned on a large rollof vellum, and suspended to a standing frame or hearse, and placed in aconspicuous situation. The seats consisted of a few cumbrous elbow-chairs,* stools of sufficient length to accommodate several persons, describedas “ conversation stools,” sometimes having ornamental ends and backs,and resembling the couches or sofas of the present day; smaller stools,large and small cushions, and window-pillows; framed tables, coveredwith Turkey carpets and cloths of embroidery, and smaller tables ofcypress and other curious woods; carved cabinets, coffers, cypress andivory chests, desks, chess-boards,t tables for backgammon and othergames; curtains at the windows and doors; a small carpet of tapestryor green cloth before the fire; andyrons on a raised hearth, with a fire-fork, tongs, and fire-pan; which, with skreens of needle-work, (as we

* I have brought you, reverend Sir, the largest elbow-chair in the house; ’tis that thesteward sits in when he holds a court.— Addison’s Drummer .

f At the feast-given by Cardinal Wolsey to the Frenchmen , at Hampton Court , Cavendishsays, speaking of the second course, “ Among all, one I noted : there was a chess-board,subtilely made of spiced plate, with men to the same; and for the good proportion, becausethat Frenchmen be very expert in that play, my lord gave the same to a gentleman of France ,commanding that a case should be made for the same in all haste, to preserve it fromperishing, in the conveyance thereof into his country.”