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tawny velvet, embroidered with bucks and unicorns; cushions of blackvelvet, embroidered with gold ; high stools, See. &c.

Narrow ©flrpttS of tapestry or woollen cloths were used at thebedside earlier, probably, than their partial application to the floors ofrooms of ceremony or state.

(ffupbOcU'bs! set with plate added to the magnificence of theseapartments, and the apparel and furniture of the or

“ boardes,” were singularly splendid: the carpet which covered LadyKytson’s was of black velvet, laced and fringed with silver and gold, andlined with taffeta. On these “ boardes” stood, or were hung on the wallsimmediately over them, or mirrors, which were few

in number, and generally made of polished steel, in frames covered withvelvet, enriched with metals and imitative jewels. Like pictures, theywere carefully preserved by draperies. In Henry the Eighth’s bed-room atHampton Court , there was a steel glass covered with yellow velvet; atWestminster he had “ a faire great steel looking-glass, set in crimsonvelvet, richly embroidered with damaske pirles, with knots of blew, and acurtain of the same blew tafata, embroidered with Venice gold, andcordiauntz of the same metaland amongst his privy purse expensesis an item, “ paied to a Frenchman for certyn loking-glasses and darteheads, iiij/i. xiijs. iiijr/.” The chief bed-chamber at Hengrave had a“ great looking-glass,” the only room in the house where such a piece offurniture is mentioned; and at Skipton Castle there was but onelooking-glass, and that not, as would be expected, in my lady’s bed-chamber, but in my lord’s.

We have before noticed the paucity of JftTfSl in bed-chambers, and,indeed, in all the apartments of ancient houses. A striking illustrationof this fact is exhibited in the will of Richard Byrchett, a man of somesubstance, who, in 1516, bequeathed to his wife “ ye chambre she lyesin, and lyberte at the fyer in ye house.”

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