ABSTRACT
Concerning the same event Sir Dudley Carleton wrote to Ralph Winwood on 6 January 1605 (Boughton House, Winwood Papers III, Northamptonshire Record Office): At night we had the Queen's masque at the banqueting house, or rather her pageant. There was an engine at the lower end of the room, which had motion, and in it were the images of sea-horses with other terrible fishes, which 5 were ridden by Moors. The indecorum was, that there was all fish and no water. At the further end was a great shell in form of a scallop, wherein were four seats; on the lowest sat the Queen with my Lady Bedford;6 on the rest 10 were placed the Ladies Suffolk, Derby, Rich, Effingham, Ann Herbert, Susan Herbert, Elizabeth Howard, Walsingham and Bevil. Their apparel was rich, but too light and curtizanlike7 for such great ones. Instead of vizzards8 their 15 faces, and arms, up to the elbows, were painted black, which was disguise sufficient, for they were hard to be known; but it became them nothing so well as their red and white, and you cannot imagine a more ugly sight than a troop of 20 lean-cheeked moors. . . .
