[Illustration: B]RAMSHILL HOUSE is one of the most perfect of the remaining mansions of the time of James the First. It is said to have been erected for the excellent Prince Henry--by whom it was never inhabited, his death having occurred before the building was completely finished. It became the property of the Lords Zouch, from whom it subsequently passed to the family of Cope--the present proprietor being Sir John Cope, Bart. The wings are comparatively plain, constructed of brick, with stone dressings; but the centre is elaborately built of stone, finely carved and profusely decorated. It supplies a striking example of the peculiar architecture of the period, when “Italian improvements” were earliest introduced into, and mixed up with, our “old Gothic manner.” This central portion of the structure is carried up in rich compartments, with pilasters, from story to story, surmounted [Illustration] by a pediment of the same character, which bears the coronet of the Prince for whom the building is said to have been designed. The interior is even more primitive and unimpaired than the exterior. The old Hall is floored and wainscotted with oak; the ceiling is enriched, and the walls are hung with family portraits in antique frames, in admirable keeping with the staid and solemn aspect of the venerable structure. The apartments throughout the mansion are of the same interesting class. In the principal drawing-room, the needle rivals the pencil upon the tapestried walls; every chamber retains unaltered its ancient character: the furniture and “garnishings” are of other days; the massive fire-places still afford space for the hospitable yule log; and in the chairs and couches that throng the several apartments, we see the quaint and elaborate carvings and embroidered coverings which exhibit the skill and industry of gone-by times. All things within the mansion are in harmony with the impressive grandeur it derives from age. Circumstances have happily existed to prevent the coarse assaults of the modern Renovator; and Bramshill House remains--and, we hope, will long continue--a fine example of the period of its erection. Such “Houses” are rarely encountered now-a-days--a mansion so little altered, within and without, that Imagination may readily recal its ancient occupants, peopling the long galleries, shadowed recesses, and spacious Hall, with the formal and stately Dames and Knights of the period when it was erected. There are, indeed, few places that are so easily associated with the past; one might almost fancy that the very chairs and tables have been unmoved during two whole centuries.