The pretty Duchess of Portsmouth had her rooms hung with silk and with wondrous tapestries from France, though England made both silks and tapestries. Beds of the day retained the high posts and tester or canopy, heavily draped, and the bed was similarly covered. The bed was carved, even to the tester, in French inspiration, and was elegant indeed. In such a bed came the King at last to lie in mortal illness in the palace at Whitehall, where the lovely Louise had first place by the royal invalid, while the Queen was treated as a negligible quantity. The Duchess of Cleveland, that other favourite, was not far in the background, and the King in his last hours remembered still another when he implored: "Don't let poor Nell starve." CHAPTER V THE END OF THE SEVENTEENTH CENTURY WILLIAM AND MARY. 1689-1702 THE style named for William and Mary embraces all the changes that occurred from late Carolean days until the time of Anne, and even includes some of the models and details that are given the name of that queen. Dutch influence comes largely into both, but was stronger in the style known as Queen Anne's. Mixed up with other influences were those not only of Holland but of the countries with which her political life was concerned. Spain contributed certain details, and as for the Dutch connections with the Near and the Far East, they supplied an infinity of inspiration. Nothing more piquant to the decorative spirit could be imagined than the fantastic motifs of Indian and Chinese importation. To us, surfeited as we are from babyhood with Chinese toys and Indian stuffs, it is hard to look upon these things as startling novelties. But in those days of less travel they were delicious exotics. Among persons of fashion, there was a rage for the living evidences of the strange East, and more than popular as pets in the drawing-room became the exotic monkey and the vivid parrot. If these creatures, leashed to a standard, could be tended by a tiny black human, then fashion was pleased to an infantine joyousness. [Illustration: Plate XXIV--INTERESTING CHAIR TRANSITIONAL BETWEEN STUART STYLES AND WILLIAM AND MARY] [Illustration: CHAIRS IN VARIANTS OF WILLIAM AND MARY Covered with petit point of the time] [Illustration: WILLIAM AND MARY CANED CHAIRS, ONE WITH FLUTED SPANISH FOOT Plate XXV] Every ship that came in from far Eastern countries brought wise parrots and tiny frisking monkeys, and these were valued by decorative artists for models, as well as by my lady to pique gay conversation in her drawing-room.