270

AN ENEMY'S APPRECIATION.

Lord's day evening, and I sometimes heard him. He could bring all the Catechism of the Westminster Assembly out of the Catechism of the Church of England. I never heard Mr Gilbert applaud anyone more than this bishop; a letter of whose, to Mr Risley the Nonconformist, which I have inserted in my Account of the ejected Ministers, plainly shows him to have been of an excellent spirit

Evelyn heard Dr. Hall, on July 11, 1669, preach the Act Sermon at St. Mary's 'in an honest practical discourse against Atheisme"," and Hearne mentions a sermon of his before the University, in 1706, without discommendation. Indeed, while describing him as a thorough pac'd Calvinist, a defender of the Republican Doctrines, a stout and vigorous advocate for the Presbyterians, Dissenters, &c., an admirer of whining, cringing Parasites, and a strenuous Persecutor of truly honest Men, as occasion offer'd itself,' Hearne goes so far as to say that he was a learn'd Divine, a good Preacher, and his Lectures, while Professor, were look'd upon by the best Judges as excellent in their kind. The grim old Tory's wrath however was excited by the epitaph to be put on the south chancel wall at Bromsgrove to Bishop Hall's memory:

'Whoever made this long, tedious Inscription, 'tis certain 'twas contriv'd on purpose to gain Proselytes to the Whiggish Party, of wch the Bp. was a great Admirer & Favourer, & 'twas to none but Men of Rebellious Principles that he bestow'd his Charity. Let them be what they would if they were Men of that Stamp they should be sure to meet with Encouragement from him. What else made him foster & advance one Slooper, & one Haynes, & some others that had no Learning, & were hardly endued with common sense? but they are known to be of the Antimonarchical, Pharisaical Strain, & can cant themselves into the good Esteem of any of the Calvinistical Brethren. What made him at the same time discourage & depress all ingenious honest Men that were for Fidelity to their rightfull Sovereign, and Enemies to Presbyterians and other Sectarists? 'Tis well the Compiler of this Epitaph has said nothing of the BP's Loyalty, he being one of the Rebell BPs & (had he been endued with all the other Virtues attributed to him in it) this would have been

parish near forty-three years, did in his Life time purchase an Estate with One Hundred Pounds. The income whereof is to be laid out in Buying of Cloaths for Poor Men and Poor Women of this Parish (who do not receive Alms) yearly for ever. And who gave 200l toward Buying of a Parsonage House.' 1 Life, i. 271 sq.

8 Collections, ed. Doble, O. H. S., ii. 343.

2 Diary, p. 342.

Ascribed to William Adams, student of Christ Church. It records the zeal with which he drove back 'ingruentes Romae et Socini errores,' his carelessness of dignities, his unwearied fidelity to his duties, and charity to the poor. The Bishop bequeathed £800 for the poor of Bromsgrove and £70 annually to purchase Bibles for distribution in the diocese.

A FRIENDLY VIEW.

271

sufficient to blacken his Character, & to render his Name odious among all Men of true Integrity & Probity, such as strictly & firmly adhere to the Doctrines of Passive Obedience & Non-Resistance'.'

A different portraiture from Hearne's is given by Dunton. He has attain'd to great Eminency of Learning and Moderation, and is an Ornament to the Church of England. His Charity to those that are in Want, and his Bounty to all Learned Men that are put to wrestle with Difficulties, are so very extraordinary, and so many do partake of them, that I need not enlarge in his Character; for 'tis acknowledg'd by all that the whole Business of his Life is to feed that Flock over which the Holy Ghost has made him Overseer.' He fed it however at a distance.

In the Book of Benefactors, on splendidly illuminated vellum, given by the Bishop to the College, it is said of him that he raised it 'ab humili conditione ad florentissimam qua nunc viget.'

1 Collections, iii. 50.

2 Life and Errors, 1705, P. 445.

CHAPTER XX.

SEVENTEENTH-CENTURY BUILDINGS AND ACCOMPTS.

THE speeches made at the inauguration of the College anticipated a great transformation of the old buildings, which were unimposing and 'vetustate collapsura.' The various descriptions of Broadgates as 'old,' 'ancient,' 'the oldest of all halls,' 'a venerable piece of antiquity,' took some colour, no doubt, from the appearance of the place. Accordingly divers of the buildings, especially those of Broadgates Hall that lay southward, next to Slaying Lane, being pulled down,' part of the monies of Tesdale and Wightwick and divers Benefactors' was at once employed in beginning a stone quadrangle. In Agas's map the top of the town-wall is seen rising above the level of the ground, as it does still beyond the Chapel; but this was now built into the masonry of the quadrangle. The south and west sides were quickly raised, and also a portion of the east side. Fuller notes under 1626, 'an old Hall turned into a new College was this yeare finished.' The forefront of Broadgates was however repaired, and left standing; troublous times came; and it was not till 1670, in Dr. Hall's Mastership, that the quadrangle was continued and the east side finished. In 1673 the irregular line of tenements facing St. Aldate's was half pulled down and its place taken by a 'fair fabrick of freestone.' The remainder of the north front as far as the common gate was built by Michaelmas, 1691; the gate tower in 1694. This work is more Palladian in character than that of 1626, which had stringcourses running between and over the windows. The later windows have heavy sills, but no hood-moulds, and are differently arranged; the dormers show alternately pointed and round heads; there is a single heavy stringcourse running horizontally between the ground floor and first floor. The tower has Italian pediments and an open balustrade. It may be noticed in Burghers' print that originally the south ground-floor rooms had steps leading up to them. This is no longer so, the level of the quadrangle, which then as now was gravelled, having since risen.

Sir J. Peshall notes: 'In digging the vault of Pembroke College

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great Numbers of human Skeletons were [found?] interred, some 16 Feet deep, many with their Feet inverted to the South.' This looks like pre-Christian sepulture; but probably the bones had been disturbed before. The vault is just inside the gateway on the right. It seems very probable that the churchyard originally extended beyond its present limits 1.

It has been said that the building of the College north front was begun in 1673 and finished by 1691, except the tower, added three years later. In 1675 Loggan published his print of Pembroke College, showing a completed quadrangle exactly as Burghers (1700) represents it when actually built-even to the position of the chimneys -except in one remarkable particular: he has put the tower in the middle of the frontage, and it is of Gothic rather than classical design. It is beyond question that such a tower never existed. It may have been in contemplation to place one there, though the gateway would more naturally face, as it had always done, the entry from Pennyfarthing Street, for the roadway in front of the College was then a mere lane between walls. It is said that in 1830, during the alterations, the foundations of such a tower were found. But it is quite impossible that, if built in 1675, it can have changed its position and character by 1694. Loggan cannot even have had before him the design of so Gothic a tower, though he must have drawn from the projected plan in other respects. Perhaps the tower was postponed for lack of funds.

The Lodgings, rebuilt in 1596 by principal Summaster, were acquired, repaired, and somewhat altered by the College immediately after its foundation. Loggan just shows the front in perspective, as it would seem an Elizabethan dwelling of lath, timber, and plaister, with dormers and overhanging upper storey. When the College front was completed, Bishop Hall, the Master, desired for his own residence. a stone edifice more in keeping with the rest of the frontage, and by Michaelmas, 1695, the outside of a new Master's House was built, with a slight encroachment on Beef Hall Lane. The building was deservedly admired. Ayliffe (1714) says: There are erected for the use of the Master very large, elegant, and convenient Lodgings, and, if the 1 Additions to Wood, p. 29. Like Wordsworth's Oxfordshire churchyard :— 'Where holy ground begins, unhallowed ends, Is marked by no distinguishable line.'

2 In 1695, from the Annunciation of the blessed Lady St. Mary the Virgin, the Corporation leased to the College a piece of void ground, thirty feet long, four feet broad at the western end and one foot at the eastern, at a peppercorn rent.

T

274 OLD QUADRANGLE AND MASTER'S LODGINGS.

whole College had been made suitable hereunto, it would be one of the neatest colleges in the University.' The expense of this erection was borne chiefly by Bishop Hall himself. A few years earlier, in 1689, the President of Corpus had built himself a house in the classical style. The whole expenditure on building from 1670 to 1699 amounted to £2,261 IS. 4d., towards which the College contributed £400 from the common chest, and from other sources of revenue, such as degree fees, nearly £200 more. There was some further expense after 1699. Among earlier contributors are the names of Mr. James Hoare, jun. 1, Comptroller of the Mint, a gentleman-commoner (£100); Sir John Bennet-to whom Loggan's print is dedicated: 'Collegii Patrono et Benefactori'--(£200); Mr. Jno. Morris of A. ffriers' (£50, and a later legacy of £50); Geo. Low, esq. (a legacy of £58 10s.). In 1693 'My Lord Ossulstone' gives another £50. I also find Mr. Thomas ffoley, gentleman-commoner, son of Speaker Foley and Member (1691-1737) for Weobley, Hereford, and Stafford (£50); Mr. George Townsend (£278 2s.): this was the surplus part of the rents bequeathed by that benefactor, who died in 1683; Sir Thomas Street, one of the Barons of the Exchequer, 'by the marriage of his lady of the kindred of Mr. Wightwick' (£20); Sir Thomas Clayton (£10); and among other minor donors a Wightwick and several Wightwick fellows. Many give £10, or ten' guineanos aureos,' 'instead of a plate. Among the names is that of the manciple, Mr. William Suthwell (£20).

The new Master's Lodgings, sixty feet in length, instead of the sloping roof and attics of the College front, had a third storey and gables, six on each side and one at the end. The east side had seventeen windows, of equal size and regularly placed, the lower ones surmounted by hoodmoulds, those in the top storey by alternate segmental and angular pediments. At the north end were three windows. A triple stringcourse ran round the building. The door had a coved hood with shell ornament in the soffit. Salmon describes the house as 'a handsome modern Edifice,' and says it has the Appearance of a gentleman's House as much as any Thing in Town.' Burghers, as

3

1 Howard in Gutch. William Howard, son of Edward, Earl of Carlisle (entered Pembroke 1693), was M.P. for Carlisle and for Northumberland; buried in Westminster Abbey July 24, 1701, vide infra p. 367. The Book of Benefactors says that Mr. James Hoar primus donavit.' He also gave a large silver-gilt cup with cover.

2 Gentlemen-commeners presented a piece of plate on admission or at leaving. Mr. Foley, e. g., gave a large goblet Japanice caelatum.'

Antient and Present State of the Universities, 1744. An odd gift by a scholar (Nathaniel Gower, M.A.) was sex aeneas seras Magistri Hospitio affigendas.'