In our description of the village in Anglo-Saxon times we gave a picture of a house of a Saxon gentleman, which consisted mainly of one large hall, wherein the members of the household lived and slept and had their meals. There was a chapel, and a kitchen, and a ladies' bower, usually separated from the great hall, and generally built of wood. In Norman times the same plan and arrangements of a country house continued. The fire still burnt in the centre of the hall, the smoke finding its way out through a louvre in the roof. Meals were still served on tables laid on trestles, which were removed when the meal was finished. The lord and lady, their family and guests, dined at the high table placed on the dais, as in a college hall, the floor of which was boarded. The household and retainers dined in the space below, which was strewn with rushes and called "the marsh," which, according to Turner's _History of Domestic Architecture_, "was doubtless dirty and damp enough to deserve that name." The timbers of the roof in the better houses were moulded, the walls hung with tapestry, and at the lower end of the hall was a screen, above which in later times was the minstrels' gallery. The screen formed a passage which led into a separate building at right angles to the hall, containing the cellar, buttery, and kitchen. Parallel with this at the upper end of the hall was a building of two stories, one used as a parlour, and the other was called the "great chamber," where the lady and her guests retired after dining in the hall. [Illustration: RICHMOND PALACE] Later on a greater refinement of domestic customs was introduced. In the twelfth century a separate sleeping-chamber for the lord was added. The next century saw him and his lady dining in a room apart from his servants, a custom which was much satirised by the author of _Piers Ploughman_, who wrote-- "Now hath each rich a rule To eaten by themselve, In a privy parlour For poor man sake, Or in a chamber with a chimney; And leave the chief hall, That was made for meals Men to eaten in." Evidently the author did not approve of the new fashion. But the advantages of the custom were much appreciated by the squires and ladies of the day, and this process of development led to a multiplication of rooms, and the diminution of the size of the great hall. The walls were raised, and an upper room was formed under the roof for sleeping accommodation. There are many old farmhouses throughout the country, once manor-houses, which retain in spite of subsequent alterations the distinguishing features of this mediaeval style of architecture. [Illustration: DOORWAY AND STAIRCASE, UFTON COURT]