The banqueting-house at Nonesuch was, like the other part of the house itself, built of timber. So, also, in all probability, was the "goodly banqueting-house" which the Lord Admiral built for the Queen when she went to his place in the year 1559 from Hampton Court. It was richly gilded and painted (we are told), "that lord having for that end kept a great many painters for a good while there in the country." But the more usual material was brick or stone, and a fair number of examples of such buildings still survive. One of the most elaborate is to be seen at Chipping Campden (Fig. 132), in Gloucestershire, where the fall of the site enables an under-storey to be obtained without being buried in the ground. The illustration shows the ground floor only, but there is a storey below it approached by a substantial staircase. The work is elaborate, and has lasted well in spite of its rather unworkmanlike treatment, as for instance in the jointing of the stone parapets. The detail is too fanciful, and the building is illustrated not so much for the sake of its design, as to show how much trouble and expense were lavished upon a structure which could only have been used a few times during the year. It and its fellow on the opposite side were, however, important features in the general lay-out. [Illustration: 133.--EYAM HALL. PLAN OF LAY-OUT.] CHAPTER VII. INTERIOR FEATURES. The chief points in the internal arrangement of houses of the period have already been explained in the third chapter. The hall was the central feature, entered at one end; next to this end was the kitchen; next to the other, or daïs end, was the parlour. The kitchen and the parlour respectively were amplified according to the accommodation required, and in the larger houses the amplification entailed one or more courts, but the hall remained the centre of the system. The need for such great amplification as we find in the larger houses arose from the fact that large retinues accompanied great personages on their visits to each other, and that there was always the chance that the sovereign might have to be entertained upon one of the progresses which were undertaken three or four times every year. Both Elizabeth and James adopted this method of keeping in touch with their subjects, and they must have become tolerably familiar with their dominions, except, perhaps, the extreme outlying parts in the north and west; and so far as James was concerned, he made the acquaintance of a good many houses in the north, on his journey from Scotland when he came to take possession of the crown. ROYAL PROGRESSES.