payer of blankettes, a coverlyght with fflowre de lyce, a selour and a testour steynyd with Seynt Kateryn at the hed and the crusifix on the selour, ... a secunde coverlyght, ij. pelow-beris (_pillow-covers_), the steynyd clothes abowte the chamber where I ly;” ... “Item, I bequethe to Fraunces Wrethe a ffetherbed, a bolster, a payer of blankettes, my best carpet, a new coverlyght with fflowers, ij. payer of schetes, ij. pelows with the berys.” These extracts from only one set of wills are sufficient to show the great advance which our forefathers had made during the fourteenth century in the comfort and richness of their beds, and how cautious we ought to be in receiving general observations on the condition of previous ages by those who write at a subsequent period. I make this observation in allusion to the account so often quoted from Harrison, who, in the description of England written in Essex during the reign of Elizabeth, and inserted in Holinshed’s “Chronicles,” informs us that “our fathers (yea, and we our selves also) have lien full oft upon straw pallets, on rough mats, covered onelie with a sheet, under coverlets made of dagswain,[52] or hopharlots (I use their owne termes), and a good round log under their heads instead of a bolster. If it were so that our fathers, or the good-man of the house, had, within seven years after his mariage, purchased a matteres, or flocke bed, and thereto a sacke of chaffe to reste his heade upon, he thought himselfe to be as well lodged as the lord of the towne, so well were they contented. Pillowes, said they, were thought meete onelie for women in child-bed. As for servants, if they had anie sheet above them it was well, for seldom had they anie under their bodies to keepe them from the pricking straws that ran oft through the canvas of the pallet, and rased their hardened hides.” A description like this could only apply to the lower classes in society, who had as yet participated but little in the march of social improvement. [Illustration: _No. 260. A. Truckle-bed._]