The great charm that we all feel in the Tudor and Jacobean periods is largely due to the beautiful paneled walls.  Their woodwork has a color that only age can give and that no stain can copy.  The first panels were longer than the later ones.  Wide use was made of the beautiful “linen-fold” design in the wainscoting, and there was also much elaborate carving and strapwork.  Scenes like the temptation of Adam and Eve were represented, heads in circular medallions, and simply decorative designs were used.  In the days of Elizabeth it became the fashion to have the carving at the top of the paneling with plain panels below.  Tudor and Jacobean mantelpieces were most elaborate and were of wood, stone, or marble richly carved, to say nothing of the beautiful plaster ones, and there are many fine examples in existence.  They were fond of figure decoration, and many subjects were taken from the Bible.  The overmantels were decorated with coats-of-arms and other carving, and the entablature over the fireplace often had Latin mottoes.  The earliest firebacks date from the fifteenth century.  Coats-of-arms and many curious designs were used upon them.

The furniture of the Tudor period was much carved, and was made chiefly of oak.  Cornices of beds and cabinets often had the egg-and-dart molding used on them, and the S-curve is often seen opposed on the backs of settees and chairs.  It has a suggestion of a dolphin and is reminiscent of the dolphins of the Renaissance.  The beds were very large, the “great bed of Ware” being twelve feet square.  The cornice, the bed-head, the pedestals and pillars supporting the cornice were all richly carved.  Frequently the pillars at the foot of the bed were not connected with it, but supported the cornice which was longer than the bed.  The “Courtney bedstead,” dated 1593, showing many of the characteristics of the ornament of the time, is 103-1/2 inches high, 94 inches long, 68 inches wide.  The majority of the beds were smaller and lower, however, and the pillars usually rose out of drum-like members, huge acorn-like bulbs that were often so large as to be ugly.  They appeared also on other articles of furniture.  When in good proportion, with pillars tapering from them, they were very effective, and gradually they grew smaller.  Some of the beds had the four apostles, Matthew, Mark, Luke and John, carved on the posts.  They were probably the origin of the nursery rhyme: 

    “Four corners to my bed,
    Four angels round my head,
    Matthew, Mark, Luke and John,
    Bless the bed that I lie on.”

[Illustration:  In this living-room, Italian, Jacobean, and modern stuffed furniture, give a satisfactory effect because each piece is good of its kind and is in a certain relationship to each other.  The huge clock with chimes and the animal casts are out of keeping.]

Bed hanging were of silk, velvet, damask, wool damask, tapestry, etc., and there were fine linen sheets and blankets and counterpanes of wool work.  The chairs were high-backed of solid oak with cushions.  There were also jointed stools, folding screens, chests, cabinets, tables with carpets (table covers) tapestry hangings, curtains, cushions, silver sconces, etc.