[Illustration: _No. 54. Putting Treasure by._]
We cannot but remark how little change the manners and the sentiments of our Saxon forefathers underwent during the long period that we are in any way acquainted with them. During the reign of Edward the Confessor, Norman fashions were introduced at court, but their influence on the nation at large appears to have been very trifling. Even after the Norman conquest the English manners and fashions retained their hold on the people, and at later periods they continually re-appear to assert their natural rights among the descendants of the Anglo-Saxons.
THE EARLY NORMAN PERIOD.--LUXURIOUSNESS OF THE NORMANS.--ADVANCE IN DOMESTIC ARCHITECTURE.--THE KITCHEN AND THE HALL.--PROVISIONS AND COOKERY.--BEES.--THE DAIRY.--MEAL-TIMES AND DIVISIONS OF THE DAY.--FURNITURE.--THE FALDESTOL.--CHAIRS AND OTHER SEATS.
A great change was wrought in this country by the entrance of the Normans. From what we have seen, in the course of the preceding chapters, society seems for a long time to have been at a standstill among the Anglo-Saxons, as though it had progressed as far as its own simple vitality would carry it, and wanted some new impulse to move it onwards. By the entrance of the Normans, the Saxon aristocracy was destroyed; but the lower and, in a great measure, the middle classes were left untouched in their manners and customs, which they appear to have preserved for a considerable length of time without any material change. The Norman historians, who write with prejudice when they speak of the Saxons, describe their nobility as having become luxurious without refinement; and they tell us that the Normans introduced greater sobriety, accompanied with more ostentation. “The nobility,” says William of Malmesbury, “was given up to luxury and wantonness.... Drinking in parties was an universal practice, in which occupation they passed entire nights as well as days. They consumed their whole substance in mean and despicable houses; unlike the Normans and French, who, in noble and splendid mansions, lived with frugality. The vices attendant on drunkenness, which enervate the human mind, followed.... In fine, the English at that time (under king Harold) wore short garments, reaching to the mid-knee; they had their hair cropped, their beards shaven, their arms laden with golden bracelets, their skin adorned with punctured designs; they were accustomed to eat till they became surfeited, and to drink till they were sick. These latter qualities they imparted to their conquerors; whose manners, in other respects, they adopted.”