the often empty walls of temporary lodgings, where were reproduced, if only on a miniature scale, the conventional ordering of presence chamber, privy chamber, and the like, which were the essentials of a royal dwelling.[1] Careful arrangements had, of course, to be made in advance; on the one hand for the maintenance of communications with London and the transaction or postponement of business during the absence of Queen and Council, and on the other for the housing and provisioning of so great a multitude in the country districts.[2] The latter had of old been the care of a special group of Hall officers known as the Harbingers.[3] These still exercised functions of detail. But the general control, like so much else, had passed into the hands of the Lord Chamberlain. Early in the summer, as soon as the royal decision as to the direction and duration of the progress could be obtained, a document was drawn up, known as the 'gestes' or 'jestes', by which must be understood, I think, not a chronicle of res gestae, but a table of the 'gysts' or gîtes appointed for each night's lodging, which is what in fact it contained.[4] Copies of the 'gestes' were signed by the Lord Chamberlain and given with warrants from himself to Gentlemen Ushers of the Chamber, who took them as instructions to the mayors of towns, and doubtless also to the lord-lieutenants of counties, through which the progress would pass. The Ushers were directed to view and report upon the lodgings
- ↑ Hunsdon to Cecil, 31 Aug. 1599 (S. P. D. cclxxii. 94): 'She . . . will go more privately than is fitting for the time, or beseeming her estate; yet she will ride through Kingston in state, proportioning very unsuitably her lodging at Hampton Court unto it, making the Lady Scudamores lodging her presence chamber, Mrs. Ratcliffes her privy chamber.' James said of certain law courts, 'They be like houses in progress, where I have not, nor can have, such distinct rooms of state as I have here at Whitehall or at Hampton Court' (Bacon, Apophthegms, in Works, vii. 166). The distribution of rooms at Theobalds for a visit of 1572 is given in Hatfield MSS. xiii. 110.
- ↑ Dasent, vii. 238; viii. 401; x. 284, 286, 305.
- ↑ The Duchess of Suffolk wrote to Cecil in 1570 (Hatfield MSS. i. 481) to 'speak but one good word for me to the harbingers, in case my man shall not be able to entreat them to help me to some lodging near the court'. The harbingers, as in origin Hall officers, would provide for the Court generally; the Gentlemen Ushers of the Chamber for the Queen in person. A P. C. warrant of 29 June 1575 (Dasent, viii. 402) is for post-horses for Simon Boier, Gentleman Usher, 'being this progresse tyme appointed to prepare her Majesties lodginges' (cf. App. A, Bibl. Note).
- ↑ For references to the 'gestes', cf. 1 Ellis, ii. 274; Wright, ii. 16; Kempe, 266; Birch, Eliz. i. 87; Hunter, Hallamshire, 123. Copies of those for 1603 and 1605 are at the Heralds' College (Lodge, App. 97, 99, 108, 109). Those for 1605 are printed (from Harl. MS. 7044?) by Leland, Coll. ii. 626, and those for 1614, with the corporation's endorsement of receipt, from the Leicester archives by Nichols, James, iii. 10.
