state occasions, and hung with tapestry; and the gallery for the reception of visitors, for amusement, and indoor exercise. This was a long room with several bay windows, projecting externally, and forming agreeable nooks for private conversation within. The gallery was often embellished with royal or family portraits, maps, &c.

The larger houses had, in addition to these apartments, the smaller in their stead, the parlours-sometimes divided into summer and winter parlours. Of these rooms, some were hung with tapestry, others wainscoted in small panels of richly grained oak; and the ceilings framed into panels also of oak, for which plaster has been substituted. Texts of scripture and moral truths were sometimes painted on cloths, which were hung in the panels of the hall or parlour.

Kitchens merit separate mention. The oldest kitchens are said to have been built by the Romans. They were mostly octagonal, (or eightsided,) with several fireplaces without chimneys: there was no wood in the building, and a stone conical roof, with a turret at top, let out the steam and smoke; some, however, had vent below the eaves, to let out steam. They generally had four ranges, a boiling place for small boiled meats, and a house for the great boiler. In each kitchen was usually a place for keeping flitches of bacon, similar to our racks in farmhouses. A kitchen of the first mentioned description exists to this day, sufficiently entire to

show the lantern roof, as may be seen in the cut. This is the kitchen of the Abbey of Glastonbury, in Somersetshire; and this office is in better

preservation than all the other buildings of the monastery. It is more than probable that chimneys were first introduced in kitchens, with widely-arched fireplaces, over which a common motto was written, as " Waste not, want not," which exhorted the cooks to care and economy. Before the invention of jacks, poor boys were hired to turn the spits, and, an old writer says, they licked the dripping pan, and grew to be huge, lusty knaves." Bellows-blowers were also officers in the king's kitchen, whose duty it was to see that soup, when on the fire, was neither burnt nor smoked.

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One of the most spacious kitchens in England is that of Raby Castle, the magnificent seat of the duke of Cleveland. It is a square of thirty feet, having three chimneys, one for the grate, a second for stoves, and the third, (now stopped up) for the great cauldron. The roof is arched, with a small cupola in the centre: it has likewise five windows, from each of which steps descend, but only in one instance to the floor; and a gallery runs round the whole interior of the building. The ancient oven is said to have allowed a tall person to stand upright in it, its diameter being fifteen feet. It has since been converted into a wine cellar, the sides being divided into ten parts, and each holding a hogshead of wine in bottles. Vast as is this kitchen, it must have been but suitable to the hospitality of former ages: for, in one of the apartments of Raby Castle, seven hundred knights are stated to have been entertained at one time.

Staircases in the older houses were carried up in separate turrets, generally circular, the steps being of stone running round a pillar in the centre, and the outer handrail grooved into the wall. In the reign of Elizabeth, staircases first became splendidly ornamented, being of wood, enriched with massive handrails and balustrades curiously carved, while the landings were superbly ornamented with figures, &c.

To return to the Hall. Several specimens of this ancient apartment are to be seen in, and within a few miles of London: as Westminster

Hall, built in 1097; Crosby Hall, Bishopsgatestreet, 1466; Eltham Palace, before 1482; the Bishop's Palace, Croydon; the Hall at Hampton Court, in the reign of Henry VIII.; Gray's Inn Hall, London, in the reign of Queen Mary; the Middle Temple Hall, 1570; and the hall of Lambeth Palace, in the reign of Charles II. The Halls in the country seats of our nobility and gentry are too numerous to mention; we may, however, observe that Haddon, in the vicinity of the famed Peak of Derbyshire, is one of the most curious and perfect, and gives the completest and most interesting ideas of our ancient halls and their compartments; but,

Green weeds o'ertop thy ruin'd wall,
Grey, venerable Haddon Hall,

The swallow twitters through thee;

Who would have thought, when in their pride,
Thy battlements the storm defied,

That Time should thus subdue thee?

Since thine unbroken early day

How many a race hath pass'd away,

In charnel vault to moulder!

Yet Nature round thee breathes an air
Serenely bright and softly fair,

To charm the awed beholder.

The materials used in building have been progressively mentioned in the preceding notices, though a few general observations may be added on the subject. Wood and stone were the earliest materials; but, as a great part of England affords no stone fit for building, her oak forests were thinned, and less durable dwellings erected of

timber only. Stone houses are, however, mentioned as belonging to the citizens of London, even in the reign of Henry II.; and probably, though not often regularly hewn stone, yet those scattered over the soil, or dug from flint quarries, bound together with a very strong cement, were employed in building manor-houses. Occasionally, hewn stone was brought from a distance to erect castles and the larger description of mansions. This was the case in the building of Windsor Castle, part of the stone being dug from the neighbourhood of Merstham, (on the Brighton road) a distance of forty miles; the quarries were then in possession of the Crown, and antiquaries tell us that a patent of Edward III. is still preserved, empowering certain persons to dig stone here for the use of Windsor Castle, and ordering the sheriff to report and apprehend such men as should refuse to work, and send them prisoners to Windsor.

Bricks were made in England by the Saxons; but they were thin, and were called wall tiles. Early in the fourteenth century bricks (in the present sense of the term) were introduced, probably from Flanders; but they did not come into general use till a century afterwards. Many considerable houses, as well as public buildings, were then erected with bricks, in counties where the deficiency of stone was most experienced. Queen's College and Clare Hall, at Cambridge, and part of Eton College, are existing specimens of bricks as they were then employed.