to moft exceffive prices, we do yet find the means to obtain and atchieve fuch furniture as heretofore has been impoffible: There are old men yet dwelling in the village where I remain, which have noted three things to be marvelloufly altered in England within their found remembrance. One is the multi tude of chimnies lately erected; whereas in their young days, there were not above two or three, if fo many, in most uplandish towns of the realm (the religious houfes and manor places of their lords always excepted, and peradventure fome great perfonages ;) but each made his fire against a reredoffe in the hall where he dined and dreffed his meat. The second is the great amendment of lodging: For, faid they, our fathers. and we ourselves have laid full oft upon ftraw pallets covered only with a fheet under coverlets made of dagfwaine or hohariots, (I use their own terms) and a good round log under their head instead of a bolfter. If it were fo, that the father or the good man of the house had a mattress or flock-bed, and thereto a fack of chaff to reft his head upon, he thought himself to be as well lodged as the lord of the town: So well were they contented. Pillows, faid they, were thought meet only for women in child-bed: As for fervants, if they had any fheet above them, it was well: For feldom had they any under their bodies to keep them from the pricking ftraws, that ran oft through the canvas, and razed their hardened hydes. The third thing they tell of is, the exchange of Treene platters (fo called I fuppofe from Tree or Wood) into pewter and wooden spoons into filver or tin. For so common were all forts of treene vef-. fels in old time, that a man fhould hardly find four pieces of pewter (of which one was peradventure a falt) in a good farmer's houfe. Defcription of Britain, chap: x. Again, in chap. xvi. In times past men were contented to dwell in houses builded of fallow, willow, &c. fo that the ufe of oak was in a manner dedicated wholly unto churches, religious houfes, princes palaces, navigation, &c. but now fallow, &c. are rejected, and nothing but oak any where regarded; and yet fee the change, for when our houfes were builded of willow, then had we oaken men; but now that our houfes are come to be made of oak, our men are not only become willow, but a great many altogether of straw, which is a fore alteration. In thefe the courage of the owner was a sufficient defence to keep the houfe in fafety; but now the affurance of the timber muft defend the men from robbing. Now have we many chimnies, and yet our tenderlines complain of rheums, catharrhs, and pofes; then had we none but reredoffes, and our heads did never ach. For as the fmoke in those days were supposed to be a fufficient hardening for the timber of the houfe; fo it was reputed a far better medicine to keep the goodman and his family from the quacke or pofe, wherewith, as then, very few VOL. IV. Сс were were acquainted. Again, in chap. xviii. Our peweterers in time paft employed the ufe of pewter only upon dishes and pots, and a few other trifles for fervice; whereas now they are grown into fuch exquifite cunning, that they can in manner imitate by infufion any form or fashion of cup, dish, falt, or bowl or goblet which is made by goldfmith's craft, though they be never fo curious and very artificially forged. In fome places beyond the fea, a garnish of good flat English pewter (I fay flat, becaufe difhes and platters in my time begin to be made deep and like basons, and are indeed more convenient both for fauce and keeping the meat warm) is almost esteemed fo precious as the like number of veffels that are made of fine filver. If the reader is curious to know the hours of meals in queen Elizabeth's reign, he may learn it from the fame author. With us the nobility, gentry, and ftudents, do ordinarily go to dinner at eleven before noon, and to fupper at five, or between five and fix at afternoon. The merchants dine and fup feldom before twelve at noon and fix at night, especially in London. The hufbandmen dine alfo at high noon, as they call it, and fup at feven or eight; but out of term in our universities the scholars dine at, ten. Note there is here no mention of breakfast : It was not then ufed, |