Project Gutenberg's The Book of Trinity College Dublin 1591-1891, by Various This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States, you'll have to check the laws of the country where you are located before using this ebook. Title: The Book of Trinity College Dublin 1591-1891 Author: Various Release Date: January 2, 2020 [EBook #61000] Language: English Character set encoding: UTF-8 *** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE BOOK OF TRINITY COLLEGE *** Produced by ellinora, John Campbell and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images generously made available by The Internet Archive/American Libraries.) TRANSCRIBER’S NOTE Footnote anchors are denoted by [number], and the footnotes have been placed at the end of each chapter. Four digit items such as [1466] are not footnote anchors but refer to a year. Macrons over e and u are displayed correctly as ē and ū. Some latin abbreviations are shown in the original text with an overline, for example Hiberniæ when abbreviated is displayed in the etext as Hibniæ, similarly to the original text. Basic fractions are displayed as ½ ¼ ¾; there are no other fractions in this book. Date ranges are displayed using – for example 1621–8, the same as the original text. Split-year dates are displayed similarly to the original text, for example 16001. The dual dates indicate the Julian (1600) and the Gregorian (1601) year designation for dates between January 1st and March 25th. Prior to 1752 dates in documents in British dominions used the Julian calendar, in which the new year did not begin until March 25th. Some other minor changes to the text are noted at the end of the book. TERCENTENARY CELEBRATION JULY, 1892 P R E S E N T E D BY THE PROVOST AND SENIOR FELLOWS OF TRINITY COLLEGE, DUBLIN POSVI DEVM ADIVTOREM MEVM Mortua anno MIserICorDIæ. HONI SOIT QVI MAL Y PENSE SEMPER EADEM Nata Gronewiciæ anno Christi MDXXXIII. 6.Jd.Sept. ELISABET D.G. ANGLIAE, FRANCIAE, HIBERNIAE, ET VERGINIAE REGINA, FIDEI CHRISTIANAE PROPVGNATRIX ACERRIMA. NVNC IN DNO REQVIESCENS. Virginis os habitumque geris, diuina virago, Sed supra sexum dotes animumque virilem; Quod sæpe altarum docuit rerum exitus ingens: Vnde tibi et Regni populi debere fatentur, Christiadumque cohors, odijs rumpantur vt hostes, Quorum Diua tua rabies nil morte lucrata est. Vasta Semiramiden Babylon super æthera tollat, Efferat et Didona suam Sidonia tellus, Gens Esthren Iudæa, Camillam Volsca propago, Aut Constantini matrem Byzantion ingens, Atqúe alias aliæ gentes: tete Anglia fortis Vt quondam fructa est, sic nunc clarescat alumna. Isaac Oliuier effigiabat. Crispin van de Passe incidebat. procurante Joanne Waldnelio. P.B.M.Q. ludeb. THE BOOK O F TRINITY COLLEGE DUBLIN 1591 Seal of the College 1891 BELFAST MARCUS WARD & CO., LIMITED, ROYAL ULSTER WORKS LONDON AND NEW YORK DUBLIN: HODGES, FIGGIS & CO., LIMITED 1892 he Committee appointed by the Provost and Senior Fellows of Trinity College, Dublin, to make arrangements for the celebration of the Tercentenary of the Foundation of the University of Dublin and of Trinity College, to be held in July, 1892, requested the following to act as a Sub-Committee to superintend the bringing out of a volume in which there should be a record of the chief events of the College for the last three centuries, a description of its buildings, &c.:— Rev. John W. Stubbs, D.D. Rev. Thomas K. Abbott, B.D., Litt.D., Librarian. Rev. John P. Mahaffy, D.D., Mus. Doc. Edward Dowden, LL.D., Litt.D. Ulick Ralph Burke, M.A. William MacNeile Dixon, LL.B., and E. Perceval Wright, M.A., M.D.; the last named to be the Convener. Through illness, Professor E. Dowden was unable to take any active part in the preparation of this volume, the publication of which was undertaken by the firm of Messrs. Marcus Ward & Co., Limited, of Belfast. The time at the disposal of the writers of the following chapters was extremely short, and they tender an apology for the want of completeness, which, on an exact scrutiny of their work, will, they fear, be only too conspicuous; but it is hoped that the volume may be acceptable as a sketch towards a History of the College. The name of the writer of each chapter is given in the Table of Contents, and each author is to be regarded as accountable only for his own share of the work. The Committee’s grateful thanks are due to Mr. Louis Fagan, of the Department of Prints and Drawings, British Museum, for the help he has given them in having reproductions made from rare engravings of some of the distinguished Graduates of the University. (Decorative section heading) CONTENTS. PAGE CHAPTER I.— FROM THE FOUNDATION TO THE CAROLINE CHARTER, BY THE REV. J. P. MAHAFFY, D.D., 1 ” II.— FROM THE CAROLINE REFORM TO THE SETTLEMENT OF WILLIAM III., BY THE REV. J. P. MAHAFFY, D.D., 29 ” III.— THE EIGHTEENTH CENTURY UP TO 1758, BY THE REV. J. P. MAHAFFY, D.D., 47 ” IV.— FROM 1758 TO THE CLOSE OF THE CENTURY, BY THE REV. J. P. MAHAFFY, D.D., 73 ” V.— DURING THE NINETEENTH CENTURY, BY THE REV. J. W. STUBBS, D.D., 91 ” VI.— THE OBSERVATORY, DUNSINK, BY SIR ROBERT BALL, LL.D., ASTRONOMER-ROYAL, 131 ” VII.— THE LIBRARY, BY THE REV. T. K. ABBOTT, B.D., LITT.D., LIBRARIAN, 147 ” VIII.— THE EARLY BUILDINGS, BY ULICK R. BURKE, M.A., 183 ” IX.— DISTINGUISHED GRADUATES, BY WILLIAM MACNEILE DIXON, LL.B., 235 ” X.— THE COLLEGE PLATE, BY THE REV. J. P. MAHAFFY, D.D., 267 ” XI.— THE BOTANICAL GARDENS AND HERBARIUM, BY E. PERCEVAL WRIGHT, M.A., M.D., 275 ” XII.— THE UNIVERSITY AND COLLEGE OFFICERS, 1892, 285 TERCENTENARY ODE, 291 (Decorative section heading) LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS. PAGE PORTRAIT OF QUEEN ELIZABETH, Frontispiece. THE OLDEST MAP OF THE COLLEGE, 7 FAC-SIMILE OF PROVOST ASHE’S PRAYER, 10 THE EARLIEST EXTANT COLLEGE SEAL, 11 THE SOUTH BACK OF THE ELIZABETHAN COLLEGE, 25 FAC-SIMILE OF TITLE-PAGE, ARCHBISHOP MARSH’S “LOGIC,” 37 CHAPEL PLATE (DATED 1632 AND 1638), 44 TITLE-PAGE OF THE CENTENARY SERMON, JANUARY 9, 16934, 52 THE OLD CLOCK TOWER, 62 CANDELABRUM, EXAMINATION HALL, 130 DUNSINK OBSERVATORY, 133 SOUTH EQUATORIAL, DUNSINK, 142 MERIDIAN ROOM, DUNSINK, 144 OLD PRINT OF LIBRARY, 1753, 152 INTERIOR OF LIBRARY, 1858, 154 A PAGE FROM THE “BOOK OF KELLS,” 161 SATCHEL OF THE “BOOK OF ARMAGH,” 164 SHRINE OF THE “BOOK OF DIMMA,” 165 BOOK RECESSES IN LIBRARY, 176 INNER STAIRCASE IN LIBRARY, 177 INTERIOR OF LIBRARY, 1860, 178 THE LIBRARY, 1891, 179 LIBRARY STAIRCASE AND ENTRANCE TO READING ROOM, 180 ROYAL ARMS NOW PLACED IN LIBRARY, 181 FRONT OF TRINITY COLLEGE, 1728, 183 GROUND PLAN OF TRINITY COLLEGE, FROM ROCQUE’S MAP OF DUBLIN, 1750, 187 AMPELOPSIS VEITCHII, 190 TRINITY COLLEGE—WEST FRONT, 191 THE PROVOST’S HOUSE, FROM GRAFTON STREET, 195 DRAWING ROOM, PROVOST’S HOUSE, 197 TOP OF STAIRCASE, REGENT’S HALL, 200 PARLIAMENT AND LIBRARY SQUARES, 201 LIBRARY SQUARE, 202 THE CHAPEL, 204 BALDWIN’S MONUMENT, 211 THE BELL TOWER, FROM THE PROVOST’S GARDEN, 215 THE DINING HALL, VIEWED FROM LIBRARY SQUARE, 218 INTERIOR OF DINING HALL, 219 THE ENGINEERING SCHOOL, FROM COLLEGE PARK, 220 ENTRANCE TO ENGINEERING SCHOOL, 222 HALL AND STAIRCASE, ENGINEERING SCHOOL, 223 CARVINGS AT BASE OF STAIRCASE, 224 THE PRINTING OFFICE, FROM NEW SQUARE, 225 VIEW IN THE COLLEGE PARK—LIBRARY—ENGINEERING SCHOOL, 228 THE MEDICAL SCHOOL, 229 THE MUSEUM (TENNIS COURT), 230 THE DISSECTING ROOM, 231 THE PRINTING OFFICE, 233 PULPIT IN DINING HALL, 234 PORTRAIT OF ARCHBISHOP USSHER, 238 PORTRAIT OF WILLIAM KING, D.D., 241 BUST OF DR. DELANY, 243 PORTRAIT OF WILLIAM MOLYNEUX, 244 BUST OF DEAN SWIFT, 244 PORTRAIT OF THOMAS SOUTHERNE, 245 PORTRAIT OF WILLIAM CONGREVE, 247 PORTRAIT OF BISHOP BERKELEY, 249 PORTRAIT OF EARL OF CLARE, 256 PORTRAIT OF LORD PLUNKET, 258 FAC-SIMILE OF ORIGINAL MS. OF “THE BURIAL OF SIR JOHN MOORE,” 260, 261 BUST OF JAMES MACCULLAGH, 263 PORTRAIT OF CHARLES LEVER, 263 TOMB OF BISHOP BERKELEY, 264 COMMUNION CUPS—MEADE, 1760; GARRET WESLEY, 1751; CAUFIELD, 1690, 267 SALVER—GILBERT, 1734, 268 THE COLLEGE MACE, 271 PUNCH BOWLS—PLUNKET, 1702; MEADE, 1708, 272 DUNCOMBE CUP, 1680; PALLISER CUP, 1709, 273 EPERGNE (REIGN OF GEORGE II.), 274 BOTANICAL GARDENS—THE POND. WINTER, 281 (Decorative chapter heading) CHAPTER I.[1] FROM THE FOUNDATION TO THE CAROLINE CHARTER. Laudamus te, benignissime Pater, pro serenissimis, Regina Elizabetha hujus Collegii conditrice, Jacobo ejusdem munificentissimo auctore, Carolo conservatore, Ceterisque benefactoribus nostris. THE CAROLINE GRACE. he origin of the University of Dublin is not shrouded in darkness, as are the origins of the Universities of Bologna and Oxford. The details of the foundation are well known, in the clear light of Elizabethan times; the names of the promoters and benefactors are on record; and yet when we come to examine the dates current in the histories of the University and the relative merits of the promoters, there arise many perplexities. The grant of the Charter is in the name of Queen Elizabeth, and we record every day in the College our gratitude for her benefaction; but it is no secret that she was urged to this step by a series of advisers, of whom the most important and persuasive remained in the background. The project of founding a University in Ireland had long been contemplated, and the current histories record various attempts, as old as 1311, to accomplish this end—attempts which all failed promptly, and produced no effect upon the country, unless it were to afford to the Roman Catholic prelates, who petitioned James II. to hand over Trinity College to their control, some colour for their astonishing preamble.[2] It is not the province of these chapters to narrate or discuss these earlier schemes. One feature they certainly possessed—the very feature denied them in the petition just named. Most of them were essentially ecclesiastical, and closely attached to the Cathedral corporations. There seems never to have been a secular teacher appointed in any of them—not to speak of mere frameworks, like that of the University of Drogheda. Another feature also they all present: they are without any reasonable endowment, the only serious offer being that of Sir John Perrott in 1585, who proposed the still current method of exhibiting English benevolence towards Ireland by robbing one Irish body to endow another. In this case, S. Patrick’s Cathedral, “because it was held in superstitious reverence by the people,” was to be plundered of its revenues to set up two Colleges—one in Armagh and one in Limerick. This plan was thwarted, not only by the downfall of its originator (Perrott), but by the active opposition of an eminent Churchman—Adam Loftus, the Archbishop of Dublin. The violent mutual hostility of these two men may have stimulated each to promote a public object disadvantageous to the other. Perrott urged the disendowment of S. Patrick’s because he knew that the Archbishop had retained a large pecuniary interest in it. Perhaps Loftus promoted a rival plan because he feared some future revival of Perrott’s scheme. Both attest their bitter feelings: for in his defence upon his trial Perrott calls the Archbishop his deadly enemy; and Loftus, in the Latin speech made in Trinity College when he resigned the Provostship, takes special credit for having resisted the overbearing fury of Perrott, and having gained for Leinster the College which the other sought to establish either in Armagh or Limerick, exposed to the dangers of rebellion and devastation.[3] But before this audience, who knew the circumstances, he does not make any claim to have been the original promoter of the foundation. Even in his defence of S. Patrick’s, he had a supporter perhaps more persuasive, because he was more respected. It is mentioned in praise of Henry Ussher, “he so lucidly and with such strength of arguments defended the rights of S. Patrick’s Church, which Perrott meant to turn into a College, that he averted that dire omen.”[4] Nevertheless, the Archbishop is generally credited with being the real founder of Trinity College, and indeed his speeches to the citizens of Dublin, of which two are still extant, might lead to that conclusion. But other and more potent influences were at work. Some years before, Case, in the preface to his Speculum Moralium Quæstionum (1585), had addressed the Chancellors of Cambridge and Oxford conjointly on the crying want of a proper University, to subdue the turbulence and barbarism of the Irish. This appeal was not original, or isolated, or out of sympathy with the age. Such laymen as Spencer, and as Bryskett, Spencer’s host near Dublin, must have long urged similar arguments. In 1547, Archbishop George Browne had forwarded to Sir William Cecil a scheme for establishing a College with the revenues of the then recently suppressed S. Patrick’s.[5] Another scheme is extant, endorsed by Cecil, dated October, 1563, with salaries named, but not the source of the endowment. In 1571, John Ussher, in applying for the rights of staple at the port of Dublin, says in his petition that he intends to leave his fortune to found a College in Dublin. In 1584, the Rev. R. Draper petitions Burghley to have the University founded at Trim, in the centre of the Pale, as this site possessed a waterway to Drogheda, and was furnished with great ancient buildings, then deserted, and falling into decay. [Pg 1] [2] [3] But in addition to these appeals of sentiment, there were practical men at work. Two successive Deputies, Sir Henry Sidney and Sir John Perrott, had urged the necessity of some such foundation (1565, 1585), and the former had even offered pecuniary aid. The Queen, long urged in this direction, had ultimately been persuaded, as appears from her Warrant, that the City of Dublin was prepared to grant a site, and help in building the proposed College; and the City, no doubt, had been equally persuaded that the Queen would endow the site. The practical workers in this diplomacy have been set down in history as Cambridge men. This is one of those true statements which disguise the truth. The real agitators in the matter were Luke Challoner and Henry Ussher. A glance at Mr. Gilbert’s Assembly Rolls of the City of Dublin the reign of Elizabeth will show how both family names occur perpetually in the Corporation as mayors, aldermen, etc.[6] The very site of the future College had been let upon lease to a Challoner and to the uncle of an Ussher.[7] These were the influential City families which swayed the Corporation. Henry Ussher,[8] who had become Archdeacon of Dublin, went as emissary to Court; Challoner[9] superintended the gathering of funds and the laying out of the site, which his family had rented years before. It was therefore by Dublin men—by citizens whose sons had merely been educated at Cambridge, and had learned there to appreciate University culture—that Trinity College was really founded. They had learned to compare Cambridge and Oxford, with Dublin, life, and when they came home to their paternal city, they felt the wide difference. Queen Elizabeth, in her Warrant, puts the case quite differently. She does not, indeed, make the smallest mention of Loftus, but of the prayer of the City of Dublin, preferred by Henry Ussher, thus: December 29, 1592. ELIZABETH, R. TRUSTEE AND RIGHT WELL BELOVED WE GREET YOU WELL, WHERE[AS] BY YOUR LRĒS, AND THE REST OF OUR COUNCELL JOYNED WITH YOU, DIRECTED TO OUR COUNCELL HERE, WEE PERCEIVE THAT THE MAJOR AND THE CITTIZENS OF DUBLIN ARE VERY WELL DISPOSED TO GRANT THE SCITE OF THE ABBEY OF ALLHALLOWS BELONGING TO THE SAID CITTY TO THE YEARLY VALUE OF TWENTY POUNDS TO SERVE FOR A COLLEDGE FOR LEARNING, WHEREBY KNOWLEDGE AND CIVILITY MIGHT BE INCREASED BY THE INSTRUCTION OF OUR PEOPLE THERE, WHEREOF MANY HAVE USUALLY HERETOFORE USED TO TRAVAILE INTO FFRANCE ITALY AND SPAINE TO GETT LEARNING IN SUCH FORREIGNE UNIVERSITIES, whereby they have been infected with poperie and other ill qualities, and soe became evill subjects, &c.[10] The Usshers and the Challoners had no inclination to go to Spain or France, nor is it likely that they ever thought they would prevent the Irish Catholic priesthood from favouring this foreign education. They desired to ennoble their city by giving it a College similar to those of Oxford and Cambridge, and they succeeded. The extant speech of Adam Loftus, to which I have already referred, makes no allusion to these things. His argument is homely enough. Guarding himself from preaching the doctrine of good works, which would have a Papistical complexion, he urges the Mayor and Corporation to consider how the trades had suffered by the abolition of the monasteries, under the previous Sovereign; how the city of Oxford and town of Cambridge have flourished owing to their Colleges; how the prosperity of Dublin, now depending on the presence of the Lord Deputy and his retinue and the Inns of Court, will be increased by a College, which would bring strangers, and with them money, to the citizens. Thus it will be a means of civilising the nation and enriching the city, and will enable many of their children to work their own advancement, “and in order thereto ye will be pleased to call a Common Council and deliberate thereon, having first informed the several Masters of every Company of the pregnant likelihood of advantage,” etc. Again, “it is my hearty desire that you would express your and the City’s thankfulness to Her Majesty,” etc. This harangue, in which “our good Lord the Archbushopp” gives himself the whole credit of the transaction, is said to have been delivered “soon after the Quarter Sessions of St. John the Baptist”—viz., about July, but in what year I cannot discover. Mr. Gilbert says, “after Easter, in the year 1590.” In Loftus’ Latin speech occurs—“As soon as I had proposed it to the Mayor and Sheriffs, without any delay they assembled in full conclave and voted the whole site of the monastery.” But in the meetings of the Dublin Council there is no allusion whatever to this speech, no thanks to the Queen, no resolution on the matter whatever, till under the date “Fourth Friday after December, 1590” (33 Elizabeth), we find the following modest business entry:—“Forasmoch as there is in this Assembly by certayne well- disposed persons petition preferred,[11] declaring many good and effectual persuacions to move our furtherance for setting upp and erecting a Collage for the bringing upp of yeouth to learning, whereof we, having a good lyking, do, so farr as in us lyeth, herby agree and order that the scite of Alhallowes and the parkes thereof shalbe wholly gyven for the erection of a Collage there; and withall we require that we may have conference with the preferrers of the said peticion to conclude how the same shalbe fynished.”[12] The Queen’s Warrant is signed the 29th December, 1592 (34 Elizabeth).[13] It is hard to find any logical place for the Archbishop’s speech, either before, between, or after these dates and documents. At all events, the Queen gave a Warrant and Charter, some small Crown rents on various estates in the South and West of Ireland, and presently, upon further petition, a yearly gift of nearly £400 from the Concordatum Fund, which latter the College enjoyed till the present century, when it was resumed by the Government. From the Elizabethan Crown rents the College now derives about £5 per annum. The Charter was surrendered for that of Charles I. [4] [5] [6] Thus the benevolences of Elizabeth, like the buildings of her foundation, have dwindled away and disappeared. The Archbishop’s sounding words have had their weight in benefiting his own memory, as has been shown, beyond his merits in this matter. The modest gift of the Corporation of Dublin, consisting of 28 acres of derelict land partly invaded by the sea, has become a splendid property, in money value not less than £10,000 a-year, in convenience and in dignity to the College perfectly inestimable. THE OLDEST MAP OF THE COLLEGE (1610). The necessary sum for repairing the decayed Abbey of All Hallowes, and for what new buildings the College required, was raised by an appeal of the Lord Deputy Fitzwilliam (dated March 11, 1591) to the owners of landed property all over Ireland. The list of these contributions is very curious, and also very liberal, if we consider that the following sums represent perhaps eight times as much in modern days:— £ s. d. £ s. d. “The Lord Deputy, 200 0 0 Advanced by his means in the Province of Munster, 100 0 0 Archbishop Adam Loftus, 100 0 0 Sir Francis Shane, 100 0 0 Sir Thomas Norreys, Vice-President of Munster, 100 0 0 ” ” a-year for his life, 20 0 0 Sir Warham St. Leger, 50 0 0 Sir Henry Harrington, 50 0 0 Sir Richard Dyer, 100 0 0 Thomas Jones, Bishop of Meath, 50 0 0 Sir Henry Bagnall, 100 0 0 The gentlemen of the Barony of Lecale, 59 0 0 Sir Richard Bingham, 20 0 0 Sir Hugh M‘Ginnis, with other gentlemen of his county [Down], 140 0 0 The Province of Connaught by same, 100 0 0 The clergy of Meath, 30 0 0 The County of Galway by same, 100 0 0 Thomas Molyneux, Chancellor of the Exchequer, 40 0 0 The town of Drogheda, 40 0 0 Luke Chaloner, D.D., 10 0 0 The city of Dublin, 27 0 0 Edward Brabazon, 15 0 0 A Concordatum from the Privy Council, 200 0 0 Sir George Bourchier, 30 0 0 Alderman John Foster (for the Iron-work), 30 0 0 Christopher Chartell, 40 0 0 Lord Chief Justice Gardiner, 20 0 0 Sir Turlough O’Neill, 100 0 0 Lord Primate of Ireland [Garvey], 76 0 0 “THESE SUMS AMOUNT TO OVER £2,000, AND THEY MUST HAVE BEEN CONSIDERABLY SUPPLEMENTED, FOR WE HAVE A RETURN MADE BY PIERS NUGENT WITH RESPECT TO ONE OF THE BARONIES IN THE COUNTY OF WESTMEATH, IN WHICH HE GIVES THE NAMES OF ELEVEN GENTLEMEN IN THAT BARONY WHO ARE PREPARED TO CONTRIBUTE ACCORDING TO THEIR FREEHOLDS, PROPORTIONALLY TO OTHER freeholders of Westmeath. “MONEY, HOWEVER, CAME IN VERY SLOWLY, SPECIALLY FROM THE SOUTH OF IRELAND; SIR THOMAS NORREYS INFORMED DR. CHALONER THAT THE COUNTY OF LIMERICK AGREED TO GIVE 3S. 4D. OUT OF EVERY PLOUGH-LAND, AND HE PROMISED TO DO HIS BEST TO DRAW OTHER COUNTIES TO SOME CONTRIBUTION, BUT HE ADDS, ‘I DO FIND DEVOTION SO COLD AS THAT I SHALL HEREAFTER THINK IT A VERY hard thing to compass so great a work upon so bare a foundation.’ “DR. LUKE CHALONER SEEMS TO HAVE BEEN THE ACTIVE AGENT IN CORRESPONDING WITH THE SEVERAL CONTRIBUTORS, AND TO HAVE been most diligent in collecting subscriptions.”[14] The coldness of Limerick—perhaps disappointed at the failure of Perrott’s scheme—contrasted with the zeal of Dublin. Dr. Stubbs quotes from Fuller, the Church historian, a statement which the latter had heard from credible persons then resident in Dublin, that during the building of the College—that is to say, for over a year—it never rained, except at night. This historically incredible statement is of real value in showing the feelings of the people who were persuaded of it. The great interest and keen hopes of the city in the founding of the College are expressed in this legendary way. Thus by the earnestness and activity of some leading citizens of Dublin, supported by the voice of educated opinion in Cambridge, the eloquence of the Archbishop, and the sound policy of Queen Elizabeth’s advisers, Trinity College was founded. The foundation-stone was laid by the Mayor of Dublin, Thomas Smith, and for at least 150 years the liberality of the Corporation of Dublin was commemorated in our prayers. “We give Thee thanks for the Most Serene Princess Elizabeth, our most illustrious Foundress; for King James and King Charles, our most munificent Benefactors, and for our present Sovereign, our Most Gracious Conservator and Benefactor; for the Right Honourable the Lord Mayor, together with his brethren, the Aldermen, and the whole assembly of the citizens of Dublin, and all our other benefactors, through whose Bounty we are here maintained for the exercise of Piety and the increase of Learning,” etc.[15] [7] [8] [9] [10] THE PRAYER BEFORE SERMON. Let thy merciful Ears, O Lord, be open to the Prayers of thy Humble Servants, and grant that thy Holy Spirit may direct and guide us in all our ways, and be more especially assistant to us in the Holy Actions of this day, in enabling us with grateful Hearts and zealous Endeavors to celebrate this Pious Commemoration, and to answer to our Studies and Improvements all the great and useful ends of our Munificent Founders and Benefactors. We render thee humble Praise and Thanks, O Lord, for the Most Serene Princess Queen Elizabeth, our Illustrious Foundress; for King James the First, our most Liberal Benefactor; King Charles the First and Second, our Gratious and Munificent Conservators; for the protection and bounty we have received from their present Majesties, our most Indulgent Patrons and Restorers; for the Favour of our present Governours, the Right Honorable the Lords-Justices; for the Lord Mayor and Goverment of this City, our Generous Benefactors; for the Nobility, Clergy, and Gentry of this Kingdom; thrô whose Bounty and Charitable Generosity we are here Educated and Established; for the Improvement of Piety and Religion, the advancement of Learning, and to supply the growing necessities of Church and State; beseeching thee to bless them all, their Posterity, Successors, Relations, and Dependants, with both Temporal and Eternal blessings, and to give us Grace to live worthy of these thy Mercies, and that as we grow in Years so we may grow in Wisdom, and Knowledg, and Vertue, and all that is praiseworthy thrô Jesus Christ our Lord Such being the true history of the foundation of Trinity College, as the mother of an University, to be a Corporation with a common seal, it was natural that upon that seal the Corporation should assume a device implying its connection with Dublin. Accordingly, though there is no formal record of the granting of arms to the College, the present arms, showing it to be a place of learning, Royal and Irish, add the Castle of the Seal of the Corporation of Dublin. Dr. Stubbs quotes (note, p. 320) a description of it in Latin elegiacs, of which the arx ignita—towers fired proper—are a modification of the Dublin arms,[16] which I have found on illuminated rolls of the age of Charles I. preserved by the City. But this description is undated, and although he ascribes it to the early years of the 17th century, it will be hard to prove it older than the seal extant in clear impressions, which bears the date 1612 above the shield, and upon it the towers, not fired, but domed and flagged. This date may even imply that the arms were then granted, and that it is the original form.[17] The recurrence of the domes and flags upon some of our earliest plate (dated 1666) gives additional authority for this feature, nor have we any distinct or dated evidence for the fired towers, adopted in the 17th century by the City also, earlier than the time of Charles II., when they are given in a Heraldic MS. preserved in the Bermingham Tower. I have digressed into this antiquarian matter in proof of my opening assertion that the details of the foundation are often obscure, while the main facts are perfectly clear. THE EARLIEST EXTANT COLLEGE SEAL. Let us now turn from our new-founded College to cast a glance at the City of Dublin of that day, as it is described to us by Elizabethan eye-witnesses, and as we can gather its features from the early records of the City and the College. Mr. Gilbert has quoted from Stanihurst’s account of Dublin, published in 1577, a curious picture of the wealth and hospitality displayed by the several Mayors and great citizens of his acquaintance; and that the Mayoralty was indeed a heavy tax upon the citizen who held it, appears from the numerous applications of Mayors, recorded in the City registers, for assistance, and the frequent voting of subsidies of £100, though care is taken to warn the citizens that this is to establish no precedent. The City is described as very pleasant to live in, placed in an exceptionally beautiful valley, with sea, rivers, and mountains around. Wealthy and civilised as it was, it would have been much more so, but that the port was open, and the river full of shoals, and that by the management of the citizen merchants a great mart of foreign traders, which used to assemble outside the gates and undersell them, had been abolished. The somewhat highly- coloured picture drawn by Stanihurst is severely criticised by Barnabe Rich,[18] who gives a very different account, telling us that the architecture was mean, and the whole City one mass of taverns, wherein was retailed at an enormous price, ale, which was brewed by the richer citizens’ wives. The moral character of the retailers is described as infamous. This liquor traffic, and the extortion of the bakers, are, to Rich, the main features in Dublin. The Corporation records show orders concerning the keeping of the pavements, the preserving of the purity of the water-supply, which came from Tallaght, and the cleansing of the streets from filth and refuse thrown out of the houses. These orders alternate with regulations to control the beggars and the swine which swarmed in the streets. Furthermore, says Stanihurst—“There are so manie other extraordinarie beggars that dailie swarme there, so charitablie succored, as that they make the whole civitie in effect their hospitall.” There was a special officer, the City beadle, entitled “master” or “warden” of the beggars, and “custos” or “overseer” of the swine, whose duty it was to banish strange beggars from the City, and keep the swine from running about the streets.[19] In one of the orders relating to this subject, dated the 4th Friday after 25th December, 1601, we find the following:—“Wher[as] peticion is exhibitid by the commons, complaineing that the auncient lawes made, debarring of swyne coming in or goeing in the streetes of this cittie, is not put in execution, by reyson whearof great danger groweth therby, as well for infection, as also the poore infantes lieing under stales and in the streetes subject to swyne, being a cattell much given to ravening, as well of creatures as of other thinges, and alsoe the cittie and government therof hardlie spoken of by the State, wherin they requirid a reformacion: it is therfore orderid and establyshid, by the aucthoritie of this assemblie, that yf eny sowe, hogge, or pigge shalbe found or sene, ether by daie or nyght, in the streetes within the cittie walles, it shalbe lawfull for everye man to kill the same sowe, hogge, or pigge, and after to dispose the same at his or their disposition, without making recompence to such as owneth the same.” [11] [12] [13] Thus this present characteristic of the country parts of Ireland then infected the capital. I have quoted the text of the order for reasons which will presently appear. The City walls, with their many towers, and protected by a fosse, enclosed but a small area of what we consider Old Dublin. S. Patrick’s and its Liberty, under the jurisdiction of the Archbishop, who lived in the old Palace (S. Sepulchre’s) beside that Cathedral, was still outside the walls, which excluded even most of Patrick Street, and was apparently defended by ramparts of its own. Thomas Street was still a suburb, and lined with thatched houses, for we find an order (1610) that henceforth, owing to the danger of fire[20] in the suburbs, in S. Thomas Street, S. Francis Street, in Oxmantown, or in S. Patrick Street, “noe house which shall from hensforth be built shalbe covered with thach, but either with slate, tyle, shingle, or boord, upon paine of x.li. current money of England.” We may therefore imagine these suburbs as somewhat similar to those of Galway in the present day, where long streets of thatched cabins lead up to the town. Such I take to have been the row of houses outside Dame’s Gate, the eastern gate of the city, which is marked on the map of 1610. They only occupy the north side of the way, and for a short distance. There had long been a public way to Hogging or Hoggen Green, one of the three commons of the City, and the condition of this exit from Dublin may be inferred from an order made in 1571, which the reader will find below.[21] The reader will not object to have some more details about the state of this College Green, now the very heart of the City, in the days when the College was founded. In 1576 the great garden and gate of the deserted Monastery of All Hallowes was ordered to be allotted for the reception of the infected, and the outer gate of All Hallowes to be repaired and locked. In the next year (and again in 1603), it is ordered that none but citizens shall pasture their cattle on this and the other greens. It is ordered in 1585 that no unringed swine shall be allowed to feed upon the Green, being noisome and hurtful, and “coming on the strand greatly hinder thincrease of the fyshe;” the tenant of All Hallowes, one Peppard, shall impound or kill them, and allow no flax to be put into the ditches, “for avoyding the hurte to thincrease of fyshe.” In the same year the use and keeping of the Green is leased for seven years to Mr. Nicholas Fitzsymons, to the end the walking places may be kept clean, and no swyne or forren cattle allowed to injure them. In 1602 Sir George Carye is granted a part of the Green to build a Hospital, and presently Dr. Challoner and others are granted another to build a Bridewell; and this is marked on the map of 1610, near the site of the present S. Andrew’s Church.[22] This is our evidence concerning the ground between the College and the City—an interval which might well make the founders speak of the former as juxta Dublin. It was a place unoccupied between the present Castle and College gates, with the exception of a row of cottages, probably thatched, forming a short row at the west end and north side of Dame Street, and under that name; opposite to this was the ruined church of S. Andrew. On the Green were pigs and cattle grazing; refuse of various kinds was cast out in front of the houses of Dame Street, despite the Corporation order; a little stream crossed this space close to the present College gate, and the only two buildings close at hand, when the student looked out of his window or over the wall, were a hospital for the infected, by the river, and a bridewell on his way to the City. Further off, the view was interesting enough. The walled City, with its gates, crowned the hill of Christ Church, and the four towers of the Castle were plainly visible. A gate, over a fosse, led into the City, where first of all there lay on the left hand the Castle entrance, with the ghastly heads of great rebels still exposed on high poles. Here the Lord Deputy and his men-at-arms kept their state, and hither the loyal gentry from the country came to express their devotion and obtain favours from the Crown. In the far distance to the south lay the Dublin and Wicklow mountains, not as they now are, a delightful excursion for the student on his holiday, but the home of those wild Irish whose raids up to the City walls were commemorated by the feast of Black Monday at Cullenswood, whither the citizens went well guarded, and caroused, to assert themselves against the natives who had once surprised and massacred 500 of them close to that wood. The river, the sea, and the Hill of Howth, held by the Baron of Howth in his Castle, closed the view to the east. The upland slopes to the north were near no wild country, and therefore Oxmantown and S. Mary’s Abbey were already settled on the other bank of the river. We must remember also, as regards the civilisation of Dublin, that though the streets swarmed not only with beggars and swine, but with rude strangers from the far country, yet the wealthy citizens were not only rich and hospitable, but advanced enough to send their sons to Cambridge. This is proved by the Usshers and Challoners, and we may be sure these were not solitary cases. As regards education, there are free schools and grammar schools constantly mentioned in the records of the time. It is well known that one Fullerton, a very competent Scotchman, was sent over by James VI. of Scotland to promote that King’s interests, and that he had a Hamilton for his assistant, who afterwards got great grants of land for himself, as Lord Clandeboye, and also obtained for the College those Crown rents which resulted in producing its great wealth. Fullerton, a learned man, was ultimately placed in the King’s household. Both were early nominated lay Fellows of the College. These were people of education who understood how to teach. But most probably the great want in Dublin was the want of books. There must have been a very widespread [14] [15]