Читать книгу Knole and the Sackvilles онлайн

14 страница из 45

It is almost a relief to go from here to the Venetian Ambassador’s Bedroom. Green and gold; Burgundian tapestry, mediaeval figures walking in a garden; a rosy Persian rug—of all rooms I never saw a room that so had over it a bloom like the bloom on a bowl of grapes and figs. I cannot keep the simile, which may convey nothing to those who have not seen the room, out of my mind. Greens and pinks originally bright, now dusted and tarnished over. It is a very grave, stately room, rather melancholy in spite of its stateliness. It seems to miss its inhabitants more than do any of the other rooms. Perhaps this is because the bed appears to be designed for three: it is of enormous breadth, and there are three pillows in a row. Presumably this is what the Italians call a letto matrimoniale.

ssss1

In a remote corner of the house is the Chapel of the Archbishops, small, and very much bejewelled. Tapestry, oak, and stained-glass—the chapel smoulders with colour. It is greatly improved since the oak has been pickled and the mustard-yellow paint removed, also the painted myrtle-wreaths, tied with a gilt ribbon, in the centre of each panel, with which the nineteenth century adorned it, when it was considered “very simple, plain, and neat in its appearance, and well adapted for family worship.” The hand of the nineteenth century fell rather heavily on the chapel: besides painting the oak yellow and the ceiling blue with gold stars, it erected a Gothic screen and a yellow organ; but fortunately these are both at the entrance, and you can turn your back on them and look down the little nave to the altar where Mary Queen of Scots’ gifts stand under the Perpendicular east window. All along the left-hand wall hangs the Gothic tapestry—scenes from the life of Christ, the figures, ungainly enough, trampling on an edging of tall irises and lilies exquisitely designed; and “Saint Luke in his first profession,” wrote Horace Walpole irreverently, “holding a urinal.” There used to be other tapestries in the house; there was one of the Seven Deadly Sins set, woven with gold threads, and there was another series, very early, representing the Flood and the two-by-two procession of the animals going into a weather-boarded Ark; but these, alas, had to be sold, and are now in America.