[23] _Nichols' Progresses of Queen Elizabeth_, Vol. II.
[24] The Secretary of Frederick, Duke of Wirtemberg. _England as seen by Foreigners in the days of Elizabeth and James I._, by W. B. Rye, p. 44.
The more usual way of treating the walls was to cover them either with hangings or with panelling. There are numberless references to the former among the poets of the time. Imogen's bedchamber was "hanged with tapestry of silk and silver"; Falstaff fell asleep behind the arras when he took his ease in his inn, and had his pocket picked; Polonius, when he hid himself in order to overhear Hamlet's interview with his mother, slipped behind the arras, and it was through the arras that Hamlet subsequently made the fatal pass with his sword. The rooms in Spencer's Castle Joyous "were round about apparelled with costly cloths of Arras and of Tours," and the parlour of Alma's castle "was with royal arras richly dight." These hangings were moved from house to house when the family migrated from one abode to another, and in Beaumont and Fletcher's _Wit without Money_ there is a lively scene in which a great lady suddenly determines to leave her house in town for the country. Amid the confusion which ensues--servants shouting, my lady's sister in much anxiety about her dog, her looking-glass, and her curls--Ralph calls to Roger to help down with the hangings, but Roger declines, as he is unable to leave the packing of his trunks. The hangings at Hampton Court were of the most costly description,[25] Cardinal Wolsey being an ardent collector, and utilizing the services of his agents in various foreign countries to add to his stores. Three-quarters of a century later much of this splendour was still left, and the German visitor whom we have already seen at Theobalds says of Hampton Court, that "all the apartments and rooms in this immensely large structure are hung with rich tapestry, of pure gold and fine silk."[26] From this regal magnificence there were numberless gradations down to the "smirch'd, worm-eaten tapestry" mentioned in that conversation between Borachio and Conrade which led to their arrest by Dogberry. The subjects of these hangings were of extreme diversity--scriptural, mythological, and allegorical. There were the stories of Toby, Our Lady, and the Forlorn Son, alongside of those of Priamus, Venus and Cupid, and Hannibal. The story of Esther balanced the Romaunt of the Rose. Christian saints and heathen gods were equally welcome, and always and everywhere, either in foliated borders or forming the subject-matter itself, were the arms of the owner, with angels or amorini to support them, and a convoluted scroll to bear the motto. The allegorical subjects are the most bewildering, and they even puzzled the people of the time, to whom such trains of thought were familiar, for it is expressly said of the tapestry in Alma's parlour that in it there was nothing portrayed nor wrought but what was easy to understand. Of course much of the tapestry which was so widely used has now disappeared, or has found its way into the hands of collectors; very little is left in its original positions, even if it remains in the houses for which it was first acquired. There is a fair amount, however, to be found up and down the country, and the effect of tapestry-hung walls in conjunction with a rich plaster ceiling is shown in Fig. 134, from a bedroom in Deene Hall, Northamptonshire.