One portion of it is occupied by Mr. ------'s gardener,
and seems not to have been repaired, at least as to its exterior, for a
great many years,--showing the old wooden frame, painted black, with
plaster in the interstices; and broad windows, extending across the whole
breadth of the rooms, with hundreds of little diamond-shaped panes of
glass. Before dinner I was shown to my room, which opens from an ancient
gallery, lined with oak, and lighted by a row of windows along one side
of the quadrangle. Along this gallery are the doors of several
sleeping-chambers, one of which--I think it is here--is called "The Dead
Man's Chamber." It is supposed to have been the room where the corpses
of persons connected with the household used to be laid out. My own room
was called "The Beam Chamber," from am immense cross-beam that projects
from the ceiling, and seems to be an entire tree, laid across, and left
rough-hewn, though at present it is whitewashed. The but of the tree
(for it diminishes from one end of the chamber to the other) is nearly
two feet square, in its visible part.
We dined, at seven o'clock, in a room some thirty-five or forty feet
long, and proportionably broad, all panelled with the old carved oak
which Mr. ------ took from the room which he had converted into a
brew-house. The oak is now of a very dark brown hue, and, being highly
polished, it produces a sombre but rich effect. It is supposed to be of
the era of Henry the Seventh, and when I examined it the next morning, I
found it very delicately and curiously wrought.
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