We have a very curious illustration of the extravagant living at table of the latter half of the fifteenth century, in the curious allegorical tapestry long preserved at Nancy, in Lorrain, and said by tradition, probably with truth, to have been the ornament of the tent of Charles le Téméraire, duke of Burgundy, when he laid siege to Nancy in 1477, and was defeated and slain. It is of Flemish workmanship, and no doubt pictures the manners of the Burgundian nobles and gentry, but at that time the court of Burgundy was the model of the fashionable life of western Europe. It happens, curiously enough, that a few years later a rather obscure French writer, named Nicole de La Chesnaye, compiling one of those allegorical dramas then so popular under the title of “Moralities,” took the story of this tapestry as his subject, and has thus left us the full explanation of what might otherwise have been not easily understood. The title of this morality is “La Nef de Santé” (the ship of health), and a second title is “La condamnacion des bancquetz” (the condemnation of banquets); and its object is to show the unhappy consequences of the extravagance in eating and drinking, which then prevailed. It opens with a conversation between three allegorical personages named Dinner, Supper, and Banquet, who declare their intention to lead joyous life evening and morning, and they resolve on imitating Passe-Temps (pastime) and Bonne-Compagnie (good company). At this moment Bonne-Compagnie herself, who is described as a dashing damsel (gorrière damoiselle), enters with all her people, namely, Gourmandize (greediness), Friandize (daintiness), Passe-Temps, already mentioned, Je-Boy-à-Vous (I drink to you), Je-Pleige-d’Autant (I pledge the same), and Acoustumance (custom). Each names what he prefers in good cheer, and Bonne-Compagnie, to begin the day, orders a collation, at which, among other things, are served damsons (prunes de Damas), which appear at this time to have been considered as delicacies. There is here a marginal direction to the purport that, if the morality should be performed in the season when real damsons could not be had, the performers must have some made of wax to look like real ones. They now take their places at table, and, while they are eating, Je-Boy-à-Vous calls the attention of the company to the circumstance that Gourmandize, in his haste to eat the damsons, had swallowed a snail. Passe-Temps next proposes a dance, and chooses for his partner the lady Friandize, comparing her to Helen, and telling her that he was Paris. She, in reply, compares herself to Medea, and her partner to Jason. Then the musicians, “placed on a stage or some higher place,” are to play a measure “pretty short.” Dinner, Supper, and Banquet next make their appearance, and, addressing Bonne-Compagnie, make their apology for entering without being invited; but the lady receives them well, asks their names, and, in return, tells them those of her people. Dinner, to show his gratitude for this friendly reception, invites the whole party to go to his feast, which is just ready; and Supper invites them to a second repast, and Banquet to a third. They accept the invitation of Dinner, and are served with friture, brouet, potage, gros pâtés, &c. Meanwhile Supper and Banquet look upon the party from “some high window,” and converse on the consequences likely to follow their excesses. This scene is represented in the first compartment of the tapestry, as it now exists (for it has undergone considerable mutilation), and is represented in our cut No. 254. It is a good picture of a seignorial repast of the fifteenth century. There are people at table, besides those enumerated in the morality, who are here indicated by their names: Passe-Temps at one end of the table, a lady to his left, and after her Je-Boy-à-Vous, who has Bonne-Compagnie by his side, and to her left Dinner, the host. To the right of Passe-Temps sits the lady Gourmandize, and to her right Je-Vous-Pleige (I pledge you), and next to him Friandize. The cups in which they are drinking are flat-shaped, and appear, by the colours in the original, to be of glass, with the brims, and other parts in some, gilt. The minstrels, in the gallery, are playing with trumpets. Among the attendants, we see the court fool, with his bauble, who had now become an ordinary, and almost a necessary, personage in the household of the rich; it was the result of an increasing taste for the coarse buffoonery which characterised an unrefined state of society. The court fool was licensed to utter with impunity whatever came to his thought, however mordant or however indecent. Beside him are two valets with dogs, which appear to have been usually admitted to the hall, and to have eaten the refuse on the spot. A window above gives us a view of the country, with buildings in the distance, and Supper and Banquet looking in upon the company. An inscription in the upper corner to the right tells us how these two personages came slyly to look at the assembly, and how through envy they conspired to take vengeance upon the feasters—

The morality next introduces the Diseases who are to be the executors of the vengeance of Supper and Banquet, and who, according to the stage directions, are to be dressed “very strangely, so that you would hardly know whether they are women or men.” These are Apoplexy, Paralysis, Pleurisy, Cholic, Quinsy, Dropsy, Jaundice, Gravel, and Gout. At the end of this scene, Supper and Banquet address themselves to these people, and ask them to undertake an assault on Bonne-Compagnie and the other guests of Dinner; and they consent at once, and Supper places them in an ambuscade in his dwelling. Meanwhile the feast ends, and Bonne-Compagnie says grace, and orders the player on the lute to perform his duty, whereupon “the instrument sounds, and the three men shall lead out the three women, and shall dance whatever dance they please, while Bonne-Compagnie remains seated.” Supper and Banquet then present themselves in turn to invite Bonne-Compagnie and her people, and they go first to Supper, who receives them with extraordinary hospitality. But Supper was a wicked traitor; and the stage directions inform us that, while the guests were enjoying themselves, his agents, the Diseases, were to be introduced watching them through a window. As soon as the substantial viands are eaten, Supper goes to order what was called the issue, or dessert; and in his absence Bonne-Compagnie orders the minstrels to play an air, and they obey. While the dessert is preparing, Supper goes to the Diseases, to ask if they are ready, and they arm and attack the guests, overthrowing tables and benches, and treating everybody with great cruelty. After some other scenes, Banquet comes to announce that his feast is ready, condoles with the sufferers on the treatment they had received from Supper, though he is meditating still greater treachery himself, and they go and feast with him. The Diseases, ready at his command, make a much more fatal attack upon the guests.

Banquet’s feast forms the second compartment of the tapestry of Nancy in its present state, and is represented in our cut No. 255. When compared with the morality, it presents some variations. In front, Banquet is standing before the table, opposite to Je-Boy-à-Vous and Je-Pleige-d’Autant, and appears to be replying to Bonne-Compagnie, who is seated between Passe-Temps and Acoustumance. Further to the left Banquet appears again, with his hand on his sword, addressing the Diseases, who are at the entrance of the hall, waiting for his signal for the attack. At the lower corner on the left we see Supper, talking with another important personage, probably intended to represent Dinner. Above, to the right, through a window, we see Banquet again, with one of his attendants fastening on his armour, while another holds his casque, which he has not yet placed on his head. The first of the inscriptions in this compartment of the tapestry, which is on the left, tells how, while the guests are feasting in all jollity, Banquet and his rout arm and come to slaughter the whole assembly— Chiere ilz tyrent joyeulsement,
Y estant Bancquet et la route
Qui s’armerent et là proprement
Occirent l’assemblée toute.
The second inscription consists of eight lines moralizing on the final ruin which often falls on those who make enjoyment the business of their lives:— Les trois folz ont grant volonté
De cherche[r] leur malle meschance;
Quant on a bien ris et chanté,
A la fin fault tourner la chance.
Ha! vous vellez avoir plaisance!
Bien l’auré vous ung tandis;
Mès gens quy prenent leur aisence,
En fin se treuvent plus mauldiz.
It is remarkable that these eight lines, taken from the tapestry, are introduced into the morality, and placed in the mouth of the fool at the end of the first scene.

It will be remarked at once that there is a much greater display of luxury in the banquet scene than in the dinner scene. Upon the table are two peacocks, each with a shield hung to its neck, no doubt to show the armorial bearings of the host; a boar’s head, dressed in the most fashionable manner; a subtelty, representing a ship filled with birds, surrounded by a sea full of fishes, and having a tall mast, with a sail made of silk and ermine, and surmounted by a figure of a naked female, intended probably to represent the goddess Venus. There are also on the table four candles, of coloured wax. A noble dresser stands against the wall, covered with vessels of gold and of glass, but the metal far predominates. The minstrels are standing apparently on the floor on a level with the guests, and consist of a man playing on the cittern, or lute, a harper, and one who plays on the pipe and drum, the latter instrument a substitute for the tabor. The valets with the dogs are again introduced, but we miss the court fool.

The remaining portions of the tapestry represent the attack of the Diseases, and the great havoc they made among the guests.

The banquet was known in England by that name, as well as by the name of rere-supper. In the curious English morality play, entitled “The Interlude of the Four Elements,” printed early in the sixteenth century, the same distinction is made between the three meals as in the French morality described above. Sensual-appetite, one of the characters in the piece, leads Humanity to the tavern to dine, and orders a dinner of three courses, with a choice variety of wines. As they are leaving after dinner, the taverner reminds them that they were to return to supper; and then Humanity proposes a cup of “new” wine, as though wine was then valued for being new. Food and liquor were formerly adulterated in more dishonest manner even than in modern times, and the taverner answers the demand jokingly— Ye shall have wyne as newe as can be,
For I may tell you in pryvyté
Hit was brued but yester nyght.
But he immediately adds— But than I have for your apetyte
A cup of wyne of olde claret;
There is no better, by this lyght.
After supper they go to dance, and meanwhile Sensual-appetite goes to prepare the banquet:—

In “Acolastus,” a work by the grammarian Palsgrave, published in 1540, the banquet is still identified with the rere-supper, when he speaks of “the rere-supper, or banket, where men syt downe to drynke and eate agayne after their meate.” And again, still later, Higins, in his “Nomenclator,” published in 1585, explains the Latin word pocœnium by “a reare-supper, or a banket after supper.” The term rere-supper was in use throughout the fifteenth century. An English vocabulary of that century speaks of a meal between dinner and supper, under the name of “a myd-dyner under-mete,” the same which, no doubt, was called by a French word, a bever, as consisting especially in taking a drink, and which, removed to the time between breakfast and dinner, is now called a luncheon.

In the introduction to Lydgate’s “Story of Thebes,” which is introduced as a continuation of the “Canterbury Tales,” the poet pretends to have arrived at the inn in Canterbury when it was occupied by the pilgrims, who invite him to sup with them, and he joins their company. “Our host,” who is the leader of the pilgrims, offers him his place at their supper heartily: Praying you (he says) to suppe with us this night,
And ye shall have made, at your devis,
A great pudding, or a round hagis,
A French moile, a tansie, or a froise.
These appear to have been the usual favourite dishes at an ordinary supper of this date (the first half of the fifteenth century). The hagis appears to have been much the same dish as the Scottish haggis of the present day. The moile was a dish made of marrow and grated bread. The tansie was a kind of omelet, resembling apparently what the French now call an omelette aux fines herbes; while the froise had small strips of bacon in it—an omelette au lard. This latter was a very favourite dish among the monks. After supper, the guests, or at least some of them, are represented as taking “strong nottie ale” before going to bed. They rise early, “anon as it is day,” and start on their return towards London; and they take no meal before dinner, having it

There is a longer preface to the supplementary tale of “Beryn,” written about the same date as the “Story of Thebes,” and printed in the edition of Chaucer’s works by Urry, in which the divisions of the day are tolerably well described. The pilgrims there arrived at their destination in Canterbury “at mydmorowe,” which is interpreted in the glossaries as meaning nine o’clock in the forenoon, and then took their lodgings, “ordeyned” their dinner, and, while it was preparing, went to make their offerings to the shrine of St. Thomas in the cathedral church. Meanwhile the Pardoner had separated from the company, and engaged in a low intrigue with the “tapster,” or barmaid, who offers him a drink, but he tells her he had not yet broken his fast—we are to conclude that this was the case with the rest of the company—and She start into the town, and set a py al hote.
Meat pies appear to have been very common articles of food in the middle ages, and to have been kept always ready at the cooks’ shops. The offering seems to have taken but a small space of time, and then— They set their signys upon their hedes, and som oppon their capp,
And sith to the dyner-ward they gan for to stapp (step);
Every man in his degré wissh (washed) and toke his sete,
As they wer wont to doon at soper and at mete;
And wer in silence for a tyme, tyl good ale gan arise.
It appears, therefore, that people did not hold conversation while eating, but that the talk and mirth began with the liquor, whether ale or wine. It was then agreed that they should remain that day in Canterbury, and all sup together at night— “Then al this after-mete I hold it for the best
To sport and pley us,” quod the hoost, “ech man as hym lest (likes),
And go by tyme to soper, and to bed also,
So mowe we erly rysen, our jorney for to do”.
Accordingly they all walk forth into the city, where the knight, who with his son had put on fresh gowns, took the latter to the town walls to explain to him their strength, and the character of the defences; and as many of the rest as had changes of apparel with them imitated their example, and they separated in parties, according to their different tastes. The monk, the parson, and the friar, went to visit some clerical acquaintance, and indulged in spiced wine. The ladies remained at home:— The wyfe of Bath was so wery, she had no wyl to walk;
She toke the priores by the honde, “Madam, wol ye stalk
Pryvely into the garden to se the herbis growe?
And after with our hostis wife in her parlour rowe (talk)?
I wol gyve yowe the wyne, and ye shul me also;
For tyl we go to soper we have naught ellis to do.”
The prioress assents to this proposal— —and forth gon they wend,
Passing forth sofftly into the herbery;
For many a herb grew for sewe (pottage) and surgery;
And all the aleys fair and parid, and raylid, and ymakid;
The sauge and the isope yfrethid and istakid;
And othir beddis by and by fresh ydight,
For comers to the hooste right a sportful sight.
When the guests reassembled, they agreed that the knight should be their “marshall” of the table, and he ordered them all to wash, and then appointed them to their seats, that they might be properly seated together, for this was part of his duty. They thus sat two and two, each couple, no doubt, at one dish— They wissh (washed), and sett right as he bad, eche man wyth his fere,
And begonne to talk of sportis and of chere
That they had the aftir-mete whiles they wer out;
For othir occupacioune, tyll they wer servid about,
They had not at that tyme, but eny man kitt (cut) a loff.
Thus it would appear that nothing eatable was as yet placed on the table but bread. Presently, the supper was served round to them, of which there was only one “service,” out of courtesy on the part of the rich members of the company towards those who were poor, as there was to be an equal division of the expenses of the supper. In return, the highest places of the table were yielded to the persons of best estate, and these, as an acknowledgment, gave a cup of wine round at their own expense, and then left the table to retire to their beds. But the less genteel of the company, the miller and the cook, with the sompnour, the yeoman, the reeve, and the manciple, remained “drinking by the moon,”—that is, they had no candle. There was, however, one candle in the bedroom, which seems to have served to light the whole company,—for it is evident that they all slept in beds in one room,—and this candle was only put out when they were all gone to bed, which was the moment the Pardoner awaited to steal away and pursue his intrigue. Next morning they were out of their beds so early that they left the town on their homeward journey at sunrise.

CHAPTER XIX.
THE CHAMBER AND ITS FURNITURE AND USES.—BEDS.—HUTCHES AND COFFERS.—THE TOILETTE; MIRRORS.

The chambers were now, except in smaller houses, mostly above the ground-floor; and, as I have already observed, the privacy of the chamber was much greater than formerly. In the poem of “Lady Bessy,” quoted in a former chapter (the whole poem is given in Mr. Halliwell’s privately printed “Palatine Anthology”), when the earl of Derby was plotting with the lady Bessy for calling in the earl of Richmond, he proposed to repair secretly to her in her chamber, in order to prepare the letters:— “We must depart (separate), lady,” the earle said then;
“Wherefore keep this matter secretly,
And this same night, betwix nine and ten,
In your chamber I think to be.
Look that you make all things ready,
Your maids shall not our councell hear,
For I will bring no man with me
But Humphrey Brereton, my true esquire.”
He took his leave of that lady fair,
And to her chamber she went full light,
And for all things she did prepare,
Both pen and ink, and paper white.
The earl, on his part,—

The description given in these lines agrees perfectly with the representations of chambers in the illuminated manuscripts of the latter part of the fifteenth century, when the superior artistic skill of the illuminators enabled them to draw interiors with more of detail than in former periods. We have almost invariably the chimney, and one “rich chair,” if not more. In our cut No. 256, we have a settle in the chamber, which is turned to the fire. This picture is taken from a manuscript of the early French translation of Josephus, in the National Library in Paris (No. 7015), and represents the death of the emperor Nero, as described by that writer. All the furniture of this chamber is of a superior description. The large chair by the bed-side is of very elegant design; and the settle, which is open at the back, is ornamented with carved panels. Our next cut (No. 257), taken from a manuscript of Lydgate’s metrical Life of St. Edmund (MS. Harl. No. 2278), represents the birth of that saint. This room is more elaborately furnished than the former. The fittings of the bed are richer; the chimney is more ornamental in its character, and is curious as having three little recesses for holding candlesticks, cups, and other articles; and we have a well-supplied cupboard, though of simple form. From the colours in the manuscript, all the vessels appear to be of gold, or of silver-gilt. The seat before the fire in this cut (No. 257) seems to be the hutch, or chest, which in Nos. 261 and 262 we shall see placed at the foot of the bed, from which it is here moved to serve the occasion.

The lady seated on this chest appears to be wrapping up the new-born infant in swaddling-clothes; a custom which, as I have remarked on a former occasion, and as we shall see again further on, prevailed universally till a comparatively recent period. Infants thus wrapped up are frequently seen in the illuminated manuscripts; and their appearance is certainly anything but picturesque. We have an exception in one of the sculptures on the columns of the Hôtel de Ville at Brussels (represented in our cut No. 258), which also furnishes us with a curious example of a cradle of the latter part of the fifteenth century.

It will, no doubt, have been remarked that in these cuts we observe no traces of carpets on the floor. In our cut No. 256, the floor is evidently boarded; but more generally, as in our cuts Nos. 257, 260, and 261, it appears chequered, or laid out in small squares, which may be intended to represent tiles, or perhaps parquetry. There is more evidence of tapestried or painted walls; although this kind of ornamentation is only used partially, and chiefly in the dwellings of the richer classes. The walls in the chamber in cut No. 257 appear to be painted. In the same cut we have an example of an ornamental mat.

The most important article of furniture in the chamber was the bed, which began now to be made much more ornamental than in previous times. We have seen in the former period the introduction of the canopy and its curtains, under which the head of the bed was placed. The celure, or roof, of the canopy, was now often enlarged, so as to extend over the whole bed; and it, as well as the tester, or back, was often adorned with the arms of the possessor, with religious emblems, with flowers, or with some other ornament. There were also sometimes costers, or ornamental cloths for the sides of the bed. The curtains, sometimes called by the French word ridels, were attached edgeways to the tester, and were suspended sometimes by rings, so as to draw backwards and forwards along a pole; but more frequently, to judge by the illuminations, they were fixed to the celure in the same manner as to the tester, and were drawn up with cords. At the two corners of the celure portions of curtain were left hanging down like bags. The curtains which draw up are represented in our cuts Nos. 259 and 260. Those in cuts Nos. 261 and 262, if not in Nos. 256 and 257, are evidently drawn along poles with rings. The latter method is thus alluded to in the old metrical romance of “Sir Degrevant:”—

The celure and tester were fixed to the wall and ceiling of the apartment, and were not in any way attached to the bed itself; for the large four-post bedsteads were introduced in the sixteenth century. In some illuminations the bed is seen placed within a square compartment separated from the room by curtains which seem to be suspended from the roof. This appears to have been the first step towards the more modern four-post bedsteads. In one of the plates to D’Agincourt’s “Histoire de l’Art” (Peinture, pl. 109), taken from a Greek fresco of the twelfth or thirteenth century in a church at Florence, we have the curtains arranged thus in a square tent in the room, where the cords are not suspended from the roof, but supported by four corner-posts. The bed is placed within, totally detached from the surrounding posts and curtains. The space thus left between the bed and the curtains was perhaps what was originally called in French the ruelle (literally, the “little street”) of the bed, a term which was afterwards given to the space between the curtains of the bed and the wall, which held rather an important place in old French chamber life, and especially in the stories of chamber intrigue.

The bedstead itself was still a very simple structure of wood, as shown in our cut No. 259, which represents the bed of a countess. It is taken from the manuscript of the romance of the “Comte d’Artois,” which has already furnished subjects for our previous chapters on the manners of the fifteenth century. The lady’s footstool is no less rude than the bedstead. The bed here evidently consists of a hard mattress. It was still often made of straw, and the bed is spoken of in the glossaries as placed upon a stramentum, which is interpreted by the English word “litter;” but feather-beds were certainly in general use during the whole of the fifteenth century. In the latter part of the fourteenth century, Chaucer (Dreme, v. 250) thus described a very rich bed:— Of downe of pure dovis white
I wol yeve him a fethir bed,
Rayid with gold, and right well cled
In fine blacke sattin d’outremere,
And many a pilowe, and every bere (pillow cover)
Of clothe of Raines to slepe on softe;
Him thare (need) not to turnen ofte.
Agnes Hubbard, a lady of Bury, in Suffolk, who made her will in 1418, left among other things, “one feather-bed” (unum lectum de plumis). A rich townsman of the same place bequeathed, in 1463, to his niece, “certeyne stuffe of ostilment,” among which he enumerates “my grene hanggyd bedde steynyd with my armys therin, that hanggith in the chambyr ovir kechene, with the curtynez, the grene keveryng longgyng therto; another coverlyte, ij. blanketts, ij. peyre of good shetes, the trampsoun, the costerys of that chambyr and of the drawgth chambyr next, tho that be of the same soort, a grete pilve (pillow) and a smal pilve; the fethirbeed is hire owne that hire maistresse gaf hire at London.” After enumerating other articles of different kinds, the testator proceeds—“And I geve hire the selour and the steynyd clooth of the coronacion of Our Lady, with the clothes of myn that long to the bedde that she hath loyen (lain) in, and the beddyng in the draught chamber for hire servaunth to lyn in; and a banker of grene and red lying in hire chambyr with the longe chayer (a settle, probably); and a stondyng coffre and a long coffre in the drawth chambyr.” William Honyboorn, also of Bury, bequeathed to his wife in 1493, “my best ffether bedde with the traunsome, a whyte selour and a testour theron, with iij. white curteyns therto, a coverlight white and blewe lyeng on the same bedde, with the blankettes.” The same man leaves to his daughter, “a ffether bedde next the best, a materas lyeng under the same, iiij. peyr shetys, iij. pelowes, a peyr blankettes.” John Coote, who made his will at Bury in 1502, left to his wife, for term of her life, “alle my plate, brasse, pewter, hanggynges, celers, testers, fetherbeddes, traunsoms, coverlytes, blankettes, shetes, pelows, and all other stuff of hussold (household);” and afterwards bequeaths these articles separately to his son and daughter, after their mother’s death:—“I will that William Coote have my beste hanged bede, celer, testor, and curteyns longgyng to the same, the beste fetherbede, the beste coverlyght, the beste peyer of blankettes, the beste peyer shetes; and Alys Coote to have the next hanged bede, celer, and testour, wyth the ij^de fetherbede, blankettes, and the ij^de peyer shetes.” In the will of Anne Barett, of Bury, dated in 1504, we read, “Item, I bequeth to Avyse my servaunte x. marc, a ffether bed, a traunsom, a payre shetes, a payre blankettes, a coverlyght.” Lastly, the will of Agar Herte, a widow of the same town, made in 1522, contains the following items:—“Item, I bequethe to Richard Jaxson, my son, a ffetherbed, ij. trawnsoms, a matras, ij. pelowes, iiij. payer of schetes, a payer of blankettes, and a coveryng of arasse, and a secunde coverlyght, a selour and a testour steynyd with fflowers, and iij. curteyns;” ... “Item, I bequethe to Jone Jaxson, my dowghter, a fetherbed, a matras, a bolster, ij. pelowes, iiij. payer of schetes, a payer of blankettes, a coverlyght with fflowre de lyce, a selour and a testour steynyd with Seynt Kateryn at the hed and the crusifix on the selour, ... a secunde coverlyght, ij. pelow-beris (pillow-covers), the steynyd clothes abowte the chamber where I ly;” ... “Item, I bequethe to Fraunces Wrethe a ffetherbed, a bolster, a payer of blankettes, my best carpet, a new coverlyght with fflowers, ij. payer of schetes, ij. pelows with the berys.”

These extracts from only one set of wills are sufficient to show the great advance which our forefathers had made during the fourteenth century in the comfort and richness of their beds, and how cautious we ought to be in receiving general observations on the condition of previous ages by those who write at a subsequent period. I make this observation in allusion to the account so often quoted from Harrison, who, in the description of England written in Essex during the reign of Elizabeth, and inserted in Holinshed’s “Chronicles,” informs us that “our fathers (yea, and we our selves also) have lien full oft upon straw pallets, on rough mats, covered onelie with a sheet, under coverlets made of dagswain,52 or hopharlots (I use their owne termes), and a good round log under their heads instead of a bolster. If it were so that our fathers, or the good-man of the house, had, within seven years after his mariage, purchased a matteres, or flocke bed, and thereto a sacke of chaffe to reste his heade upon, he thought himselfe to be as well lodged as the lord of the towne, so well were they contented. Pillowes, said they, were thought meete onelie for women in child-bed. As for servants, if they had anie sheet above them it was well, for seldom had they anie under their bodies to keepe them from the pricking straws that ran oft through the canvas of the pallet, and rased their hardened hides.” A description like this could only apply to the lower classes in society, who had as yet participated but little in the march of social improvement.

As the privacy of the chamber had become greater, it seems now to have been much less common in private mansions for several people to sleep in the same room, which appears more rarely to have had more than one bed. But a bed of a new construction had now come into use, called a truckle or trundle bed. This was a smaller bed which rolled under the larger bed, and was designed usually for a valet, or servant. The illuminations in the manuscript of the romance of the “Comte d’Artois,” already quoted more than once, furnish us with the early example of a truckle-bed represented in our cut No. 260. The count d’Artois lies in the bed under the canopy, while the truckle-bed is occupied by his valet (in this case, his wife in disguise). The truckle-bed is more frequently mentioned in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. Every reader will remember the speech of mine host of the Garter, in the “Merry Wives of Windsor” (act iv. sc. 5), who says of Falstaff’s room, “There’s his chamber, his house, his castle, his standing bed and truckle-bed.” It was the place allotted to the squire, when accompanying the knight on “adventures.” So in Hudibras (part ii. canto ii.)— When Hudibras, whom thoughts and aking
’Twixt sleeping kept all night and waking,
Began to rub his drowsy eyes,
And from his couch prepared to rise,
Resolving to dispatch the deed
He vow’d to do, with trusty speed;
But first, with knocking loud and bawling,
He roused the squire, in truckle lolling.
In the English universities, the master-of-arts had his pupil to sleep in his truckle-bed.

The chamber, as the most private part of the house, was stored with chests and coffers, in which the person who occupied it kept his money, his deeds and private papers, and his other valuables. Margaret Paston, writing from Norwich to her husband about the year 1459, gives a curious account of the preparations for his reception at home. “I have,” she says, “taken the measure in the drawte chamber, there as ye would your coffers and your cowntewery (supposed to mean a desk for writing) should be set for the while, and there is no space beside the bed, though the bed were removed to the door, for to set both your board (table) and your coffers there, and to have space to go and sit beside; wherefore I have purveyed that ye shall have the same drawte chamber (withdrawing room—the origin of our name of drawing-room for the salon) that ye had before, thereat ye shall lye to yourself; and when your gear is removed out of your little house, the door shall be locked, and your bags laid in one of the great coffers, so that they shall be safe, I trust.” The hucches (hutches) or chests, and coffers, in the bed-chamber, are frequently mentioned in old writings. The large hutch seems to have been usually placed at the foot of the bed. In one of our preceding cuts (No. 257) we have seen it moved from its place to make a temporary seat before the fire. The cut annexed (No. 261), taken from a manuscript Latin Bible in the National Library in Paris (No. 6829), shows us the hutch in its usual place, and opened so as to expose its contents to our view. It is here evidently filled with money, and the persons who have entered the chamber seem to be plundering it. In a very popular old story, the same in substance as that of Macbeth and his daughters, an old man, on the marriage of his daughter, weakly gives up all his property to the young married pair, trusting to their filial love for his sustenance, and they go on treating him worse and worse, until he is saved from actual destitution by a deception he practises upon them. In one version of the story, given in English verse in a manuscript of the fifteenth century, the father goes to a friend and borrows a large sum of money in gold, which he places in his coffer, and, having invited them to his dwelling, and persuaded them to remain all night, he contrives that early in the morning they shall, as by accident, espy him counting his gold. The unfilial children, who supposed that he had given them all he possessed, were astonished to find him still rich, and were induced, by their covetousness, to treat him better during the rest of his life. The poem describes the old man leaving his bed to count the gold in his chest:— But on the morow, at brode daylight,
The fadir ros, and, for they shulden here
What that he dide in a boistous manere,
Unto his chest, which thre lokkes hadde,
He went, and therat wrethed he ful sadde,
And whan it was opened and unshit,
The bagged gold bi the merchaunt hym lent
He hath untied, and streight forth with it
Unto his beddis feete gone is and went,
What doth thanne this sel man and prudent
But out the gold on a tapit hath shot,
That in the bagges left ther no grot.
—MS. Harl. 372, fol. 88, v^o.
Robbers, or plunderers in time of war, when breaking into a house, always made direct for the chamber. Among the letters of the Paston family, is a paper by a retainer of sir John Fastolf, who had a house in Southwark, giving an account of his sufferings during the attack upon London by Jack Cade and the commons of Kent in 1450, in which he tells how “the captain (Cade) sent certain of his meny to my chamber in your rents, and there broke up my chest, and took away one obligation of mine that was due unto me of 36l. by a priest of Paul’s and one other obligation of one Knight of 10l., and my purse with five rings of gold, and 17s. 6d. of gold and silver; and one harness (suit of armour) complete of the touch of Milan; and one gown of fine perse blue, furred with martens; and two gowns, one furred with bogey (budge), and one other lined with frieze.” One of John Paston’s correspondents, writing from London on the 28th of October, 1455, gives the following still more pertinent account of the robbing of a man’s house:—“Also there is great variance between the earl of Devonshire and the lord Bonvile, as hath been many day, and much debate is like to grow thereby; for on Thursday at night last past, the earl of Devonshire’s son and heir came, with sixty men of arms, to Radford’s place in Devonshire, which (Radford) was of counsel with my lord Bonvile; and they set a house on fire at Radford’s gate, and cried and made a noise as though they had been sorry for the fire; and by thet cause Radford’s men set open the gates and yede (went) out to see the fire; and forthwith the earl’s son aforesaid entered into the place, and entreated Radford to come down of his chamber to speak with them, promising him that he should no bodily harm have; upon which promise he came down, and spoke with the said earl’s son. In the mean time his meny (retinue) rob his chamber, and rifled his hutches, and trussed such as they could get together, and carried it away on his own horses.” As soon as this was done, Radford, who was an eminent lawyer residing at Poghill, near Kyrton, and now aged, was led forth and brutally murdered. In the stories and novels of the middle ages, the favoured lover who has been admitted secretly into the chamber of his mistress is often concealed in the hutch or chest.