The large and spacious houses, with their
oriel, latticed windows, their huge fireplaces, and their gabled roofs,
breathe of the days of hose and doublet, of pearl-embroidered stomachers,
and complicated oaths. They were upraised in the days "when men knew how
to build." The hard red bricks have only grown more firmly set with
time, and their oak stairs do not creak and grunt when you try to go down
them quietly.
Speaking of oak staircases reminds me that there is a magnificent carved
oak staircase in one of the houses in Kingston. It is a shop now, in the
market-place, but it was evidently once the mansion of some great
personage. A friend of mine, who lives at Kingston, went in there to buy
a hat one day, and, in a thoughtless moment, put his hand in his pocket
and paid for it then and there.
The shopman (he knows my friend) was naturally a little staggered at
first; but, quickly recovering himself, and feeling that something ought
to be done to encourage this sort of thing, asked our hero if he would
like to see some fine old carved oak. My friend said he would, and the
shopman, thereupon, took him through the shop, and up the staircase of
the house. The balusters were a superb piece of workmanship, and the
wall all the way up was oak-panelled, with carving that would have done
credit to a palace.
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