_Cil cunduaient les barons_ _Par les degrez, pur les garçons;_ _Od les verges k’es mains teneient_ _As barons vaie fesaient,_ _Ke jà garçon ne s’apremast,_ _Si alcon d’els ne l’ comandast_--
he adds, that those who carried the provisions and liquor to the table were also attended by these ushers, that the “_lecheurs_” might not snatch from them, or spoil, or break, the vessels in which they carried them:--
_Ensement tut revenaient par els_ _Cil ki aportouent les mès_ _De la quisine e des mesters,_ _E li beveres e li mangers,_ _Icil usser les cunduaient,_ _Pur la vessele dunt servaient,_ _Ke lecheur ne les escheçast,_ _Ne malmeist, ne defrussast._ --Gaimar, Estorie des Englès, l. 5985.
[Illustration: _No. 56. The Norman Butler in his Office._]
In the cut from the Bayeux tapestry, the feasting-room is approached by what is evidently a staircase of stone. In our cut No. 56, taken from a manuscript of the earlier half of the twelfth century in the Cottonian library (Nero, C. iv.), and illustrating the story of the marriage feast at Cana, the staircase is apparently of wood, little better than a ladder, and the servants who are carrying up the wine assist themselves in mounting by means of a rope. It is a picture which at the same time exhibits several characteristics of domestic life--the wine vessels, the cupboard in which they are kept, and the well in the court-yard, the latter being indicated by the tree. The butler, finding wine run short, sends the servant to draw water from the well. It may be remarked that this appears to have been the common machinery of the draw-well among our forefathers in the middle ages--a rude lever, formed by the attachment of a heavy weight, perhaps of lead, at one end of the beam, which was sufficient to raise the other end, and thus draw up the bucket. It occurs in illuminations in manuscripts of various periods; our example in cut No. 57 is taken from MS. Harl. No. 1257, of the fourteenth century.
[Illustration: _No. 58. Norman Cooks and the Attendants serving at Table._]
Whatever truth there may be in William of Malmesbury’s account of the sobriety of the Normans, there can be no doubt that the kitchen and the cooks formed with them a very important part of the household. According to the Bayeux tapestry, duke William brought with him from Normandy a complete kitchen establishment, and a compartment of that interesting monument, of which we here give a diminished copy, shows that when he landed he found no difficulty in providing a dinner. On the left two cooks are boiling the meat--for this still was the general way of cooking it, as it was usually eaten salted. Above them, on a shelf, are fowls, and other sorts of small viands, spitted ready for roasting. Another cook is engaged at a portable stove, preparing small cakes, pasties, &c., which he takes from the stove with a singularly formed fork to place them on the dish. Others are carrying to the table the roasted meats, on the spits. It will be observed that having no “board” with them to form a table, the Norman knights make use of their shields instead.