namentation, either in plaster, tile, or carved wood.
Many rooms were panelled completely in wood—walls and ceiling. Pictures were often painted directly on the wood panel or firmly let into, as a part of, the wall. Heraldic devices, either painted or carved, were frequently a part of the permanent ornamentation. Wood floors were generally made extremely solid by laying the flooring boards on edge instead of on the side. The floors of the great hall, however, were frequently tiled.
It may be well to end this section with a quotation from Drake relative to the houses of the lower classes.
"The houses or cottages of the farmer were built, in places abounding in wood, in a very strong and substantial manner, with not more than four, six, or nine inches between stud and stud; but in the open champaine country, they were compelled to use more flimsy materials, with here and there a girding to which they fastened their splints, and then covered the whole with a thick clay to keep out the wind. 'Certs, this rude kind of building,' says Harrison, 'made the Spaniards in queene Maries dales to wonder, but cheefelie when they saw what large diet was used in manie of these so homelie cottages, in so much
