other mansions, some of the
apartments were adorned in the Oriental manner with metrical
descriptions called Proverbs. And Warton mentions an ancient suit of
tapestry, containing Ariosto's Orlando, and Angelica, where, at every
group, the story was all along illustrated with short lines in
Provencal or old French.

It could only be from its superior comfort that an article so tedious
in manufacture as needlework tapestry could be preferred to the more
quickly-produced decorations of the pencil; it was also rude in
design; and the following description of some tapestry in an old Manor
House in King John's time, though taken from a work of fiction,
probably presents a correct picture of the style of most of the pieces
exhibited in the mansions of the middle ranks at that period.

"In a corner of the apartment stood a bed, the tapestry of which was
enwrought with gaudy colours representing Adam and Eve in the garden
of Eden. Adam was presenting our first mother with a large yellow
apple, gathered from a tree that scarcely reached his knee. Beneath
the tree was an angel milking, and although the winged milkman sat on
a stool, yet his head overtopped both cow and tree, and nearly
covered a horse, which seemed standing on the highest branches. To the
left of Eve appeared a church; and a dark robed gentleman holding
something in his hand which looked like a pincushion, but doubtless
was intended for a book: he seemed pointing to the holy edifice, as if
reminding them that they were not yet married. On the ground lay the
rib, out of which Eve (who stood the head higher than Adam) had been
formed; both of them were very respectably clothed in the ancient
Saxon costume; even the angel wore breeches, which, being blue,
contrasted well with his flaming red wings."

No one who has read the real blunders of artists and existing
anachronisms in pictures detailed in "Percy Anecdotes," will think the
above sketch at all too highly coloured; though doubtless the tapestry
hangings introduced by Queen Eleanor which would be imitated and
caricatured in ten thousand different forms, were in much superior
style. The Moors had attained to the highest perfection in the
decorative arts, and from them did the Spaniards borrow this fashion
of hangings,[76] and "the coldness of our climate (says her
accomplished biographer, Miss Agnes Strickland, speaking of Eleanor,)
must have made it indispensable to the fair daughter of the South,
chilled wi