In the northern wing of Ufton Court we come once more upon associations with the name of Arabella Fermor—the “fair Belinda” of the “Rape of the Lock.” Here it was that she came to live upon her marriage in 1715 with Mr. Francis Perkins, a member of an ancient Roman Catholic family. Mr. Perkins in honour of his bride had the rooms in this wing newly decorated in the elegant style of the early eighteenth century. The ceiling of the larger room, which is still called Belinda’s Parlour, is adorned with mouldings of graceful design, while the small panelling on the walls was replaced by the tall decorated panels then just come into fashion. In the same way a lofty window was introduced to shed light upon the whole. [Illustration: ARABELLA FERMOR (MRS. PERKINS) _By W. Sykes_] [Illustration: FRANCIS PERKINS _By W. Sykes_] We learn from an old list of the furniture of Ufton Court that in a small room near to Belinda’s Parlour there stood formerly a harpsichord and an ombre table, the latter singularly suggestive of the heroine of the “Rape of the Lock.”[12] [Footnote 12: See _The History of Ufton Court_, by H. Mary Sharp.] Two fine portraits exist of Mr. and Mrs. Perkins, which probably hung in Belinda’s room. They are both signed with the name of W. Sykes, an artist who flourished in the early part of the eighteenth century. That of Mrs. Perkins must have been painted before her marriage, as her maiden name is inscribed upon the picture, together with two lines from the “Rape of the Lock,” thus:— _Mrs. Arabella Fermor_ “_On her white breast a sparkling cross she wore,_ _Which Jews might kiss and Infidels adore._” The lady’s dress is of a soft greenish blue colour so often seen in portraits of that period. The only engravings which exist of these portraits were taken from copies of them made by Gardner, but they are not satisfactory, and it is to the kindness of the present owner of the original pictures that we are indebted for permission to reproduce them in this work. Mary Russell Mitford has written much of Ufton Court. She delighted in wandering about the old rambling mansion. “It retained strong marks of former stateliness,” she writes, “in the fine proportion of the lofty and spacious apartments, the rich mouldings of the ceilings, the carved chimney-pieces and panelled walls; while the fragments of stained glass in the windows of the great gallery, the relics of mouldering tapestry that fluttered against the walls, and above all the secret chamber constructed for a priest’s hiding-place in the days of Protestant persecution conspired to give Mrs. Radcliffe-like Castle of Udolpho sort of romance to the manor-house.” [Illustration: BELINDA’S PARLOUR]