_Execution of Charles I._ (Vol. ii., pp. 72. 110-140. 158.).--In Lilly's
_History of his Life and Times_, I find the following interesting
account in regard to the vizored execution of Charles I., being part of
the evidence he gave when examined before the first parliament of King
Charles II. respecting the matter. Should any of your correspondents be
able to substantiate this, or produce more conclusive evidence in
determining who the executioner was, I shall be extremely obliged. Lilly
writes,--
"Liberty being given me to speak, I related what follows: viz.,
That the next Sunday but one after Charles I. was beheaded,
Robert Spavin Secretary to Lieutenant-General Cromwell at that
time, invited himself to dine with me, and brought Anthony
Pearson and several others along with him to dinner. That their
principal discourse all dinner time was only who it was that
beheaded the king. One said it was the common hangman; another,
Hugh Peters; others were also nominated, but none concluded.
Robert Spavin, so soon as dinner was done, took me by the hand,
and carried me to the south window. Saith he, 'These are all
mistaken; they have not named the man that did the fact: it was
Lieutenant-Colonel Joice. I was in the room when he fitted
himself for the work; stood behind him when he did it; when
done, went in with him again: there is no man knows this but my
master, viz. Cromwell, Commissary Ireton, and myself.'--'Doth
Mr. Rushworth know it?' saith I. 'No, he doth not know it,'
saith Spavin. The same thing Spavin since has often related to
me, when we were alone."
R.W.E.
Cheltenham.
_Paper Hangings_ (Vol. ii., p. 134.).--"It was on the walls of this
drawing-room (the king's at Kensington Palace) that the then new art of
paper-hangings, in imitation of the old velvet flock, was displayed with
an effect that soon led to the adoption of so cheap and elegant a
manufacture, in preference to the original rich material from which it
was copied."--W.H. Pyne's _Royal Residences_, vol. ii. p. 75.