Page:Archaeological Journal, Volume 1.djvu/233

Rh The chamber is here distinctly pointed out, as being adjacent to the hall. We may quote as another proof of this the fabliau Des trois dames qui trouverent un anel (Barbazan, iii. 220), where the Lady in her chamber sees what is passing in the hall par un pertuis.

A stable was also frequently adjacent to the hall, probably on the side opposite to the chamber or bed-room. In the fabliau of Le povre clere (Meon. i. 104), the same story as Dunbar's tale of the Friar of Berwick, when the miller and the clerk, his guest, knock at the door of the miller's house, the wife urges the priest, who is with her in the hall, to hide himself in the stable (croiche):—

From the stable the priest looks into the hall through a window, which must have been in the partition wall:—

Behind the house was the court or cortil, which was surrounded by a fence, and included the garden, with a bersil (or sheep-cot), and other out-houses. The back door of the hall opened into this court. In the Diz don soucretain (Meon. i. 318), the gallant comes through the court, and is let into the hall by the back door. In the fabliau Du prestre et d'Alison (Barbazan, iv. 427), a woman is introduced into the chamber by a false or back door, whilst the hall is occupied by company:—

The arrangements of a common house in the country are illustrated by the fabliau De Barat et de Haimet (Barbazan, iv. 253). Two thieves undertake to rob a third of "a bacon" which he (Travers) had hung on the beam or rafter of the hall:—

The thieves make a hole in the wall by which one enters,