dwindled into mere sinecures, and are of little use in promoting the diffusion of sound knowledge. The public are invited to attend, and, as the professors are talented men, this seems a boon; but it rarely happens that a visitor is induced to go a second time. The lectures are often spiritless and formal, evidently treated as mere task-work, and not at all likely now to endanger the prosperity of Oxford or Cambridge. The discourses are only read in term time-first in Latin, at twelve o'clock at noon; and again, at one o'clock, in English. The reading occupies from forty minutes to an hour. The doors open as the clock strikes, and should there not be three persons waiting for admission, the doors are instantly shut again, and no lecture is given on that day. Even previous to the final ejectment from Gresham's mansion, the College had fallen into disrepute, and was irreverently denominated in the London Spy, "Wiseacres' Hall."

There is a small engraving of the house, which gives a clear idea of the place. The view looks eastward; the distant buildings communicate with Bishopsgate-street. Among these was the reading hall. On the south and north of the quadrangle, which was about a hundred feet square, were piazzas, and over one of these was a long gallery, with a projecting window at the western end. There were eight almshouses in front, distinguished by doorways with porches, and over these, looking west, was a second gallery. This side was 200 feet in length, and opened in the direction of Broad-street. In the print alluded to, an open archway is shown (which led to the stables), and on which two persons are represented, one kneeling, his sword on the ground, and his arms thrown up; the other threatening him with a drawn sword. They represent Mead and Woodward, both physicians, the last of whom was a professor in the College. Dr. Woodward had done or said something offensive to Dr.

Mead, who resolved to have amends, and meeting Woodward as he was returning to the College, drew upon him. They fought. Mead getting the better, commanded him to beg his life, but Woodward answered, "No, doctor, that I will not-till I am your patient." He yielded, however, and gave up his sword. Strange that so pitiful a quarrel should have been thus perpetuated.

A parting glance at Gresham leads us to his shop in Lombard-street, nearly opposite the Post Office, and now the site of a banking-house, where the great merchant's original sign, a grasshopper, might once have been seen. It was taken away by a partner of the firm, and is now thought to be lost or destroyed. We regret so precious a relic was not preserved. Men like Gresham are always rare, and as one of the benevolent heroes of a remote age we can hardly venerate him too much. Sometimes, when we lived in the City, and traversed the streets and ways about Bishopsgate and the Exchange, in our reveries, as we walked over the silent pavement, a sheet of moonlight bringing out sharply Sir Thomas from his dark niche, or throwing its silvery lustre over the portly modern pile which has superseded his palatial home, seemed to bring back Gresham and his times in all their old-world interest. Our readers will think us visionaries; but at such moments the Tudor terrors and splendours, Bluff Hal, and Queen Bess, with butterfly courtiers, mailed knights, fair women, rich merchants, and thriving tradesmen, all troop around, while we seem wending our way to Gresham Court, with a special invitation to supper at eight precisely.

106

CHRIST'S HOSPITAL.

LONDON is rich in schools of a superior character. A very new foundation, the City School, has already gained the distinction of educating some highly accomplished pupils; and the kingdom can produce no temples of learning which surpass Merchant Taylors' School, St. Paul's School, and Christ's Hospital. The records of them are all enriched with many names illustrious for erudition and talent of a high order; and each of the learned professions has derived advantage from the admirable system of instruction to which the acolytes of each are submitted. Dean Colet's School and that of the Merchant Taylors are almost wholly devoted to the classics; but the City of London School and (during the last century or more) Christ's Hospital, give, with a thorough introduction to the dead languages, much information as to more practical knowledge, thus fitting the scholar for the ordinary business and occupations of life, as well as for the studious application called for at Oxford and Cambridge.

Christ's Hospital is essentially a school for the children of the poor. Founded by the princely benevolence of a youthful king, it was intended to be dedicated wholly to charitable purposes; yet we seldom or ever connect a Blue-coat Boy with the idea of poverty; and while a parish school, with its pewter badge, is necessarily asso

ciated with images of destitution and want, we are not at all surprised to find yellow-stockinged and bareheaded tyroes from Newgate-street walking unabashed with gaily-dressed ladies, or riding in the carriages of the rich. No doubt the children of the very poor obtain presentations occasionally, but a far larger number are disposed of in wellto-do families, where the cost of education would not be burdensome. Sometimes such a provision makes glad the heart of a scantily provided widow, who rejoices in such a prospect for her well-born son; and sometimes the gift is conferred on the orphan, whose parents thought of nothing less than that their noble boy should be indebted for instruction to King Edward's bounty. Too often, however, the "children's bread" is mistakenly carried to homes where there is no lack, and lads assume the blue coat whose well-to-do or wealthy parent should blush at thus diverting from its right channel the munificent provision set apart for the really needy. I could speak of such cases coming within my own knowledge. Some check to the abuse is sadly wanted: why should the rich elbow the poor out of their own hospital?

A religious house of mendicant Grey Friars, who came from Italy in 1224, were the original occupants of Christ's Hospital. Its site was once "a voyd plot of ground neere to St. Nicholas' Shambles," given to the friars by a charitable mercer, John Ewin, where they erected "very beautiful buildings, partly at the charges of Ewin," who ultimately was glad to retreat from the world, and join the order as a lay brother. A noble church and various other buildings were soon annexed to the primitive institution, and it became one of the many flourishing conventual establishments in London. In 1429, the executors of Richard Whittington added a library, 109 feet in length, and 36 feet broad. It "was all seeled with wainscot, having twenty-eight deskes, and eight double settles of

wainscot." It was soon supplied with books which cost the then large sum of £556 10s. The founders "bare four hundred pounds." The remainder was supplied by Dr. Thomas Winchelsey, a friar of the order, who commanded the works of Nicholas de Lisa to be chained to a

desk in the chapel. This priory was surrendered to Henry the Eighth in 1538, when its annual value was £32 198. 10d. Then the church became a warehouse for foreign goods, the splendid monuments being defaced or destroyed. Stow enumerates the remarkable persons buried here, and adds:—“All these, and fives times so many more, have been interred there, whose tombs are wholly defaced; for there were nine such of alabaster and marble environed with stickes of iron, in the quire, and one in the body of the church, also coped with iron, all pulled down, besides seven score gravestones of marble, all sold for fifty pounds by Sir Martin Bowes, goldsmith, and alderman of London, of late time buried there."

In Stow's list of the illustrious dead buried here, we find four queens-Margaret, second wife of Edward I., 1317; Isabel, wife of Edward II., 1358; Joan of the Tower, Queen of Scots, her daughter, 1362; and Isabel, Baroness Fitzwaren, Queen of the Isle of Man; a Duchess of Bretagne, and various great warriors, noblemen, wealthy merchants, and Lord Mayors.

The dissolution of the monasteries was a source of extreme misery to the poor, who for ages were used to receive a daily alms-dole at their gates; and the increasing destitution led to the first enactment of poor laws, in the reign of Elizabeth, previous to which efforts had been made to ameliorate the public calamity by founding houses of mercy for the indigent and ignorant, as well as prisons to restrain and punish the profligate. Edward VI. has justly the credit of most of these pious works. Yet his father, "Bluff Hal," began the work, in some relenting