It would appear, then, that the original house was a Jacobean building, and from the fact that Lord Craven was a bachelor and was resident abroad for the greater part of his life previous to the Restoration, it is highly improbable that he did any building during that period; he had neither family nor leisure to induce him. On the sale of the property in 1651, it is quite possible that the house was partly dismantled,[50] as were many others in similar circumstances, notably Holdenby House. On his return in 1660, or as soon afterwards as he could, he set about restoring his home. He preserved the Jacobean front, but added a new top story and new sides. The drawing of the portico, which would be at the back of the house shown by Kip, is dated 1662; that of the gate-piers in the front wall is dated 1663 (Fig. 110), and those in the circular wall at the rear 1673; a ceiling is dated 1686. The baron’s coronet indicates that the work was done before the earldom was bestowed, which was in 1663. The dates on the drawings suggest what one might expect, that the house itself was first taken in hand, then the garden walls and lay out, and subsequently the embellishment of some of the chief rooms. [Illustration: FIG. 111.--Gate Piers at Hamstead Marshall.] If the history of the house is rightly conjectured, there would be no room for Gerbier in its design, for he is said to have died in 1662 when he was at least seventy years old, and there is no trace of senility in the Bodleian drawings. They are vigorous in design as well as drawing; the gate-piers (Fig. 111) are still in existence, some scattered, as it were, in a field, others still leading into a walled garden. It is only when the imagination restores the walls that once connected them that an idea is formed of the size of the original enclosures to which those piers were the noble entrances. The ceiling (Fig. 112), dated 1686 on the drawing, is of the type prevalent throughout the greater part of the seventeenth century, and usually employed by Jones, Webb, and Wren. As Wynne--“the learned and ingenious Captain Wynne” Campbell calls him[51]--is the only other person whose name is connected with the designing of Hamstead Marshall, the credit may fairly be placed to his account. The character of the new work, as shown by Kip, accords with the treatment usually adopted by Webb; that is to say, the walls are fairly plain, there is a wide cornice at the eaves. The height of the roof is proportioned to the walls (not merely determined by the span of the building), it is crowned by cupolas and broken by dormers, and the chimneys are short and solid--perhaps, in this case, in consequence of the teaching of Gerbier, Wynne’s master.