Thence we pass on into a small panelled chamber, used by the King as a study, or private oratory. It is draped with faded tapestry, and contains a copy of a remarkable portrait of Dame Penderel, whereby 'hangs a tale.' An old canvas, which for many years had been used as a 'drawer' for a kitchen fireplace, proved, upon being cleaned, to be a portrait of Joan Penderel, mother of the young men who assisted King Charles in his escape. It was probably the work of some local artist, and bears the inscription DAME . PENDERIL . ANNO . DOM . 1662. A glance at the portrait will shew a countenance full of quiet dignity and character, surmounted by a queer, peaked, gipsy hat, a white coif falling around the face, and the red rose held between thumb and finger. Upon the floor of this chamber stands an ancient coffer, carved with a very quaint representation of the Royal Oak, and the words C . R . BOSCOBEL . 1651. This coffer is depicted at the end of the present chapter. Upstairs we are shewn the secret closet that opens into the great outside chimney already referred to. Then, clambering to the garret, a trap-door is lifted at the head of the stairs, revealing the dark, narrow hole, into which the unfortunate monarch had to squeeze himself whenever his enemies drew nigh. A short ladder leads down into it; and, when Charles was in hiding here, cheeses were rolled over the spot, so that His Majesty might lurk in security, if not exactly in comfort. Hence a rude stairway, fashioned in the thickness of the wall, communicates with the lower hidie-hole, enabling the refugee to escape outside the house by means of the chimney stair before mentioned. Bidding farewell to Boscobel, we now retrace our steps to the old ruin beside the wood. Here in the depths of Brewood Forest was founded, in Richard Plantagenet's reign, a Cistercian nunnery, which, on account of the white habit of the nuns, was called Whiteladies; in contradistinction to the Black Ladies of the Benedictine monastery, just across the Staffordshire border. The establishment appears to have continued, with more or less prosperity, until the date of the Dissolution of the Monasteries; but then John Leland's note of 'Byrwoode, a Priory of White Nunnes, lately suppressid, in the very Marche of Shropshire into Darbyshire,' tells its own tale of surrender and spoliation. Of the conventual buildings little now remains save the north wall of a chapel of Norman date, with several circular-headed windows, a good Norman doorway with a cusp-like ornamentation around the head, and a large arch opening into a transept, now gone. Such slight fragments of carved work as remain, upon capital or string-course, are refined in character. [Illustration: At Whiteladies.]