themselves, is said to have been commenced in 1600, and to have been completed in 1651, and though a little later than, according to some authorities, the best time of the Renaissance, is so good a representation of German work of this period that it will well repay an examination.  As the author was responsible for its arrangement in its present position, he has the permission of the Rev. Mother at the head of S. Saviour’s to say that any one who is interested in Art will be allowed to see the chapel.

[Illustration:  German Carved Oak Buffet, 17th Century. (From a Drawing by Prof.  Heideloff.)]

The Renaissance In England.

England under Henry the Eighth was peaceful and prosperous, and the King was ambitious to outvie his French contemporary, Francois I., in the sumptuousness of his palaces.  John of Padua, Holbein, Havernius of Cleves, and other artists, were induced to come to England and to introduce the new style.  It, however, was of slow growth, and we have in the mixture of Gothic, Italian and Flemish ornament, the style which is known as “Tudor.”

It has been well said that “Feudalism was ruined by gunpowder.”  The old-fashioned feudal castle was no longer proof against cannon, and with the new order of things, threatening walls and serried battlements gave way as if by magic to the pomp and grace of the Italian mansion.  High roofed gables, rows of windows and glittering oriels looking down on terraced gardens, with vases and fountains, mark the new epoch.

[Illustration:  Carved Oak Chest in the Style of Holbein.]

The joiner’s work played a very important part in the interior decoration of the castles and country seats of this time, and the roofs were magnificently timbered with native oak, which was available in longer lengths than that of foreign growth.  The Great Hall in Hampton Court Palace, which was built by Cardinal Wolsey and presented to his master, the halls of Oxford, and many other public buildings which remain to us, are examples of fine woodwork in the roofs.  Oak panelling was largely used to line the walls of the great halls, the “linen scroll pattern” being a favorite form of ornament.  This term describes a panel carved to represent a napkin folded in close convolutions, and appears to have been adopted from German work; specimens of this can be seen at Hampton Court, and in old churches decorated in the early part of the sixteenth century.  There is also some fine panelling of this date in King’s College, Cambridge.

In this class of work, which accompanied the style known in architecture as the “Perpendicular,” some of the finest specimens of oak ornamented interiors are to be found, that of the roof and choir stalls in the beautiful Chapel of Henry VII. in Westminster Abbey, being world famous.  The carved enrichments of the under part of the seats, or “misericords,” are especially minute, the subjects apparently being taken from old German engravings.  This work was done in England before architecture and wood carving had altogether flung aside their Gothic trammels, and shews an admixture of the new Italian style which was afterwards so generally adopted.