ose, and bring the ornament into relief. The entire length is 52 ft.
and average height 8 ft. 3 in. If this panelling could be arranged as it
was fitted originally in the house of one of Elizabeth's subjects, with
models of fireplace, moulded ceiling, and accessories added, we should
then have an object lesson of value, and be able to picture a Drake or a
Raleigh in his West of England home.

[Illustration: Carved Oak Elizabethan Bedstead.]

A later purchase by the Science and Art Department, which was only secured
last year for the extremely moderate price of L1,000, is the panelling of
a room some 23 ft. square and 12 ft. 6 in. high, from Sizergh Castle,
Westmoreland. The chimney piece was unfortunately not purchased, but the
Department has arranged the panelling as a room with a plaster model of
the extremely handsome ceiling. The panelling is of richly figured oak,
entirely devoid of polish, and is inlaid with black bog oak and holly, in
geometrical designs, being divided at intervals by tall pilasters fluted
with bog oak and having Ionic capitals. The work was probably done
locally, and from wood grown on the estate, and is one of the most
remarkable examples in existence. The date is about 1560 to 1570, and it
has been described in local literature of nearly 200 years ago.

[Illustration: Oak Wainscoting, From an old house in Exeter. S. Kensington
Museum. Period: English Renaissance (About 1550-75).]

While we are on the subject of panelling, it may be worth while to point
out that with regard to old English work of this date, one may safely take
it for granted that where, as in the South Kensington (Exeter) example,
the pilasters, frieze, and frame-work are enriched, and the panels plain,
the work was designed and made for the house, but, when the panels are
carved and the rest plain, they were bought, and then fitted up by the
local carpenter.

Another Museum specimen of Elizabethan carved oak is a fourpost bedstead,
with the arms of the Countess of Devon, which bears date 1593, and has all
the characteristics of the time.

There is also a good example of Elizabethan woodwork in part of the
interior of the Charterhouse, immortalised by Thackeray, when, as
"Greyfriars," in "The Newcomes," he described it as the old school "where
the colonel, and Clive, and I were brought up," and it was here that, as a
"poor brother," the old colonel had returned to spend the evening of his
gentle life, and, to quote Thacker