Queen Street, Lincoln’s Inn; and one or two monuments and porches, are amongst the examples that remain to us of this great master’s work; and of interiors, that of Ashburnham House is left to remind us, with its quiet dignity of style, of this great master.  It has been said in speaking of the staircase, plaster ornament, and woodwork of this interior, “upon the whole is set the seal of the time of Charles I.”  As the work was probably finished during that King’s reign, the impression intended to be conveyed was that after wood carving had rather run riot towards the end of the sixteenth century, we had now in the interior designed by Inigo Jones, or influenced by his school, a more quiet and sober style.

[Illustration:  The King’s Chamber, Ford Castle.]

The above woodcut shews a portion of the King’s room in Ford Castle, which still contains souvenirs of Flodden Field—­according to an article in the Magazine of Art.  The room is in the northernmost tower, which still preserves externally the stern, grim character of the border fortress; and the room looks towards the famous battle-field.  The chair shews a date 1638, and there is another of Dutch design of about fifty or sixty years later; but the carved oak bedstead, with tapestry hangings, and the oak press, which the writer of the article mentions as forming part of the old furniture of the room, scarcely appear in the illustration.

Mr. Hungerford Pollen tells us that the majority of so-called Tudor houses were actually built during the reign of James I., and this may probably be accepted as an explanation of the otherwise curious fact of there being much in the architecture and woodwork of this time which would seem to have belonged to the earlier period.

The illustrations of wooden chimney-pieces will show this change.  There are in the South Kensington Museum some three or four chimney-pieces of stone, having the upper portions of carved oak, the dates of which have been ascertained to be about 1620; these were removed from an old house in Lime Street, City, and give us an idea of the interior decoration of a residence of a London merchant.  The one illustrated is somewhat richer than the others, the columns supporting the cornice of the others being almost plain pillars with Ionic or Doric capitals, and the carving of the panels of all of them is in less relief, and simpler in character, than those which occur in the latter part of Elizabeth’s time.

[Illustration:  Carved Oak Centre Table. In the Hall of the Carpenters’ Company.]

The earliest dated piece of Jacobean furniture which has come under the writer’s observation is the octagonal table belonging to the Carpenters’ Company.  The illustration, taken from Mr. Jupp’s book referred to in the last chapter, hardly does the table justice; it is really a very handsome piece of furniture, and measures about 3 feet 3 inches in diameter.  In the spandrils of the arches between