The Constable then, with three reverences, knelt before the King of the Revels, and, delivering up his naked sword, prayed to be taken into the royal service. Next entered Hatton, the Master of the Game, clad in green velvet, his rangers arrayed in green satin. Blowing "a blast of venery" three times on their horns, and holding green-coloured bows and arrows in their hands, the rangers paced three times round the central fire, then knelt to the King of the Revels, and desired admission into the royal service. Next ensued a strange and barbarous ceremony. A huntsman entered with a live fox and cat and nine or ten couple of hounds, and, to the blast of horns and wild shouting, the poor creatures were torn to shreds, for the amusement of the applauding Templars. At supper the Constable entered to the sound of drums, borne upon a scaffold by four men, and as he was carried three times round the hearth every one shouted, "A lord! a lord!"

He then descended, called together his mock court, by such fantastic names as—

Sir Francis Flatterer, of Fowlershurst, in the county of Buckingham;

Sir Randal Rakabite, of Rascal Hall, in the county of Rakebell;

Sir Morgan Mumchance, of Much Monkery, in the county of Mad Mopery;

and the banquet then began, every man having a gilt pot full of wine, and each one paying sixpence for his repast. That night, when the lights were put out, the noisy, laughing train passed out of the portal, and the long revels were ended.

"Sir Edward Coke," says Lord Campbell, writing of this period, "first evinced his forensic powers when deputed by the students to make a representation to the benchers of the Inner Temple respecting the bad quality of their commons in the hall. After laboriously studying the facts and the law of the case, he clearly proved that the cook had broken his engagement, and was liable to be dismissed. This, according to the phraseology of the day, was called 'the cook's case,' and he was said to have argued it with so much quickness of penetration and solidity of judgment, that he gave entire satisfaction to the students, and was much admired by the Bench."

In his exquisite "Prothalamion" Spenser alludes to the Temple as if he had sketched it from the river, after a visit to his great patron, the Earl of Essex,—

"Those bricky towers, The which on Thames' broad, aged back doe ride, Where now the studious lawyers have their bowers, There whilom wont the Templar Knights to bide, Till they decayed through pride."

Sir John Davis, the author of "Nosce Teipsum," that fine mystic poem on the immortality of the soul, and of that strange philosophical rhapsody on dancing, was expelled the Temple in Elizabeth's reign, for thrashing his friend, another roysterer of the day, Mr. Richard Martin, in the Middle Temple Hall; but afterwards, on proper submission, he was readmitted. Davis afterwards reformed, and became the wise Attorney-General of Ireland. His biographer says, that the preface to his "Irish Reports" vies with Coke for solidity and Blackstone for elegance. Martin (whose monument is now hoarded up in the Triforium) also became a learned lawyer and a friend of Selden's, and was the person to whom Ben Jonson dedicated his bitter play, The Poetaster. In the dedication the poet says, "For whose innocence as for the author's you were once a noble and kindly undertaker: signed, your true lover, BEN JONSON."

On the accession of James I. some of his hungry Scotch courtiers attempted to obtain from the king a grant of the fee-simple of the Temple; upon which the two indignant societies made "humble suit" to the king, and obtained a grant of the property to themselves. The grant was signed in 1609, the benchers paying L10 annually to the king for the Inner Temple, and L10 for the Middle. In gratitude for this concession, the two loyal societies presented his majesty with a stately gold cup, weighing 200-1/2 ounces, which James "most graciously" accepted. On one side was engraved a temple, on the other a flaming altar, with the words nil nisi vobis; on the pyramidical cover stood a Roman soldier leaning on his shield. This cup the bibulous monarch ever afterwards esteemed as one of his rarest and richest jewels. In 1623 James issued another of those absurd and trumpery sumptuary edicts, recommending the ancient way of wearing caps, and requesting the Templars to lay aside their unseemly boots and spurs, the badges of "roarers, rakes, and bullies."

The Temple feasts continued to be as lavish and magnificent as in the days of Queen Mary, when no reader was allowed to contribute less than fifteen bucks to the hall dinner, and many during their readings gave fourscore or a hundred.

On the marriage (1613) of the Lady Elizabeth, daughter of King James I., with Prince Frederick, the unfortunate Elector-Palatine, the Temple and Gray's Inn men gave a masque, of which Sir Francis Bacon was the chief contriver. The masque came to Whitehall by water from Winchester Place, in Southwark; three peals of ordnance greeting them as they embarked with torches and lamps, as they passed the Temple Garden, and as they landed. This short trip cost L300. The king, after all, was so tired, and the hall so crowded, that the masque was adjourned till the Saturday following, when all went well. The next night the king gave a supper to the forty masquers; Prince Charles and his courtiers, who had lost a wager to the king at running at the ring, paying for the banquet L30 a man. The masquers, who dined with forty of the chief nobles, kissed his majesty's hand. Shortly after this twenty Templars fought at barriers, in honour of Prince Charles, the benchers contributing thirty shillings each to the expenses; the barristers of seven years' standing, fifteen shillings; and the other gentlemen in commons, ten shillings.

One of the grandest masques ever given by the Templars was one which cost L21,000, and was presented, in 1633, to Charles I. and his French queen. Bulstrode Whitelocke, then in his youth, gives a vivid picture of this pageant, which was meant to refute Prynne's angry "Histro-Mastix." Noy and Selden were members of the committee, and many grave heads met together to discuss the dances, dresses, and music. The music was written by Milton's friend, Lawes, the libretto by Shirley. The procession set out from Ely House, in Holborn, on Candlemas Day, in the evening. The four chariots that bore the sixteen masquers were preceded by twenty footmen in silver-laced scarlet liveries, who carried torches and cleared the way. After these rode 100 gentlemen from the Inns of Court, mounted and richly clad, every gentleman having two lackeys with torches and a page to carry his cloak. Then followed the other masquers—beggars on horseback and boys dressed as birds. The colours of the first chariot were crimson and silver, the four horses being plumed and trapped in parti-coloured tissue. The Middle Temple rode next, in blue and silver; and the Inner Temple and Lincoln's Inn followed in equal bravery, 100 of the suits being reckoned to have cost L10,000. The masque was most perfectly performed in the Banqueting House at Whitehall, the Queen dancing with several of the masquers, and declaring them to be as good dancers as ever she saw.

The year after the Restoration Sir Heneage Finch, afterwards Earl of Nottingham, kept his "reader's feast" in the great hall of the Inner Temple. At that time of universal vice, luxury, and extravagance, the banquet lasted from the 4th to the 17th of August. It was, in fact, open house to all London. The first day came the nobles and privy councillors; the second, the Lord Mayor and aldermen; the third, the whole College of Physicians in their mortuary caps and gowns; the fourth, the doctors and advocates of civil law; on the fifth day, the archbishops, bishops, and obsequious clergy; and on the fifteenth, as a last grand explosion, the King, the Duke of York, the Duke of Buckingham, and half the peers. An entrance was made from the river through the wall of the Temple Garden, the King being received on landing by the Reader and the Lord Chief Justice of the Common Pleas; the path from the garden to the wall was lined with the Reader's servants, clad in scarlet cloaks and white doublets; while above them stood the benchers, barristers, and students, music playing all the while, and twenty violins welcoming Charles into the hall with unanimous scrape and quaver. Dinner was served by fifty young students in their gowns, no meaner servants appearing. In the November following the Duke of York, the Duke of Buckingham, and the Earl of Dorset were admitted members of the Society of the Inner Temple. Six years after, Prince Rupert, then a grizzly old cavalry soldier, and addicted to experiments in chemistry and engraving in his house in the Barbican, received the same honour.

The great fire of 1666, says Mr. Jeaffreson, in his "Law and Lawyers," was stayed in its westward course at the Temple; but it was not suppressed until the flames had consumed many sets of chambers, had devoured the title-deeds of a vast number of valuable estates, and had almost licked the windows of the Temple Church. Clarendon has recorded that on the occasion of this stupendous calamity, which occurred when a large proportion of the Templars were out of town, the lawyers in residence declined to break open the chambers and rescue the property of absent members of their society, through fear of prosecution for burglary. Another great fire, some years later (January, 1678-79), destroyed the old cloisters and part of the old hall of the Inner Temple, and the greater part of the residential buildings of the "Old Temple." Breaking out at midnight, and lasting till noon of next day, it devoured, in the Middle Temple, the whole of Pump Court (in which locality it originated), Elm-tree Court, Vine Court, and part of Brick Court; in the Inner Temple the cloisters, the greater part of Hare Court, and part of the hall. The night was bitterly cold, and the Templars, aroused from their beds to preserve life and property, could not get an adequate supply of water from the Thames, which the unusual severity of the season had frozen. In this difficulty they actually brought barrels of ale from the Temple butteries, and fed the engines with the malt liquor. Of course this supply of fluid was soon exhausted, so the fire spreading eastward, the lawyers fought it by blowing up the buildings that were in immediate danger. Gunpowder was more effectual than beer; but the explosions were sadly destructive to human life. Amongst the buildings thus demolished was the library of the Inner Temple. Naturally, but with no apparent good reason, the sufferers by the fire attributed it to treachery on the part of persons unknown, just as the citizens attributed the fire of 1666 to the Papists. It is more probable that the calamity was caused by some such accident as that which occasioned the fire which, during John Campbell's attorney-generalship, destroyed a large amount of valuable property, and had its origin in the clumsiness of a barrister who upset upon his fire a vessel full of spirit. Of this fire Lord Campbell observes:—"When I was Attorney-General, my chambers in Paper Buildings, Temple, were burnt to the ground in the night-time, and all my books and manuscripts, with some valuable official papers, were consumed. Above all, I had to lament a collection of letters written to me by my dear father, from the time of my going to college till his death in 1824. All lamented this calamity except the claimant of a peerage, some of whose documents (suspected to be forged) he hoped were destroyed; but fortunately they had been removed into safe custody a few days before, and the claim was dropped." The fire here alluded to broke out in the chambers of one Thornbury, in Pump Court.



"I remember," says North in his "Life of Lord Keeper Guildford," "that after the fire of the Temple it was considered whether the old cloister walks should be rebuilt or rather improved into chambers, which latter had been for the benefit of the Middle Temple; but, in regard that it could not be done without the consent of the Inner Houses, the masters of the Middle Houses waited upon the then Mr. Attorney Finch to desire the concurrence of his society upon a proposition of some benefit to be thrown in on his side. But Mr. Attorney would by no means give way to it, and reproved the Middle Templars very bitterly and eloquently upon the subject of students walking in evenings there, and putting 'cases,' which, he said, 'was done in his time, mean and low as the buildings were then. However, it comes,' he said, 'that such a benefit to students is now made little account of.' And thereupon the cloisters, by the order and disposition of Sir Christopher Wren, were built as they now stand."



The last revel in any of the Inns of Court was held in the Inner Temple, February, 1733 (George II.), in honour of Mr. Talbot, a bencher of that house, accepting the Great Seal. The ceremony is described by an eye-witness in "Wynne's Eunomus." The Lord Chancellor arrived at two o'clock, preceded by Mr. Wollaston, Master of the Revels, and followed by Dr. Sherlock, Bishop of Bangor, Master of the Temple, and the judges and serjeants formerly of the Inner Temple. There was an elegant dinner provided for them and the chancellor's officers, but the barristers and students had only the usual meal of grand days, except that each man was furnished with a flask of claret besides the usual allowance of port and sack. Fourteen students waited on the Bench table: among them was Mr. Talbot, the Lord Chancellor's eldest son, and by their means any special dish was easily obtainable from the upper table. A large gallery was built over the screen for the ladies; and music, placed in the little gallery at the upper end of the hall, played all dinner-time. As soon as dinner was over, the play of Love for Love and the farce of The Devil to Pay were acted, the actors coming from the Haymarket in chaises, all ready-dressed. It was said they refused all gratuity, being satisfied with the honour of performing before such an audience. After the play, the Lord Chancellor, the Master of the Temple, the judges and benchers retired into their parliament chamber, and in about half an hour afterwards came into the hall again, and a large ring was formed round the fire-place (but no fire nor embers were in it). Then the Master of the Revels, who went first, took the Lord Chancellor by the right hand, and he with his left took Mr. J[ustice] Page, who, joined to the other judges, serjeants, and benchers present, danced, or rather walked, round about the coal fire, according to the old ceremony, three times, during which they were aided in the figure of the dance by Mr. George Cooke, the prothonotary, then upwards of sixty; and all the time of the dance the ancient song, accompanied with music, was sung by one Tony Aston (an actor), dressed in a bar gown, whose father had been formerly Master of the Plea Office in the King's Bench. When this was over, the ladies came down from the gallery, went into the parliament chamber, and stayed about a quarter of an hour, while the hall was putting in order. Then they went into the hall and danced a few minutes. Country dances began about ten, and at twelve a very fine collation was provided for the whole company, from which they returned to dancing. The Prince of Wales honoured the performance with his company part of the time. He came into the music gallery wing about the middle of the play, and went away as soon as the farce of walking round the coal fire was over.

Mr. Peter Cunningham, apropos of these revels, mentions that when the floor of the Middle Temple Hall was taken up in 1764 there were found nearly one hundred pair of very small dice, yellowed by time, which had dropped through the chinks above. The same writer caps this fact by one of his usually apposite quotations. Wycherly, in his Plain Dealer (1676—Charles II.), makes Freeman, one of his characters, say:—"Methinks 'tis like one of the Halls in Christmas time, whither from all parts fools bring their money to try the dice (nor the worst judges), whether it shall be their own or no."

The Inner Temple Hall (the refectory of the ancient knights) was almost entirely rebuilt in 1816. The roof was overloaded with timber, the west wall was cracking, and the wooden cupola of the bell let in the rain. The pointed arches and rude sculpture at the entrance doors showed great antiquity, but the northern wall had been rebuilt in 1680. The incongruous Doric screen was surmounted by lions' heads, cones, and other anomalous devices, and in 1741 low, classic windows had been inserted in the south front. Of the old hall, where the Templars frequently held their chapters, and at different times entertained King John, King Henry III., and several of the legates, several portions still remain. A very ancient groined Gothic arch forms the roof of the present buttery, and in the apartment beyond there is a fine groined and vaulted ceiling. In the cellars below are old walls of vast thickness, part of an ancient window, a curious fire-place, and some pointed arches, all now choked with modern brick partitions and dusty staircases. These vaults formerly communicated by a cloister with the chapel of St. Anne, on the south side of the church. In the reign of James I. some brick chambers, three storeys high, were erected over the cloister, but were burnt down in 1678. In 1681 the cloister chambers were again rebuilt.

During the formation of the present new entrance to the Temple by the church at the bottom of Inner Temple Lane, when some old houses were removed, the masons came on a strong ancient wall of chalk and ragstone, supposed to have been the ancient northern boundary of the convent.

Let us cull a few Temple anecdotes from various ages:—

In November, 1819, Erskine, in the House of Lords, speaking upon Lord Lansdowne's motion for an inquiry into the state of the country, condemned the conduct of the yeomanry at the "Manchester massacre." "By an ordinary display of spirit and resolution," observed the brilliant egotist to his brother peers (who were so impressed by his complacent volubility and good-humoured self-esteem, that they were for the moment ready to take him at his own valuation), "insurrection may be repressed without violating the law or the constitution. In the riots of 1780, when the mob were preparing to attack the house of Lord Mansfield, I offered to defend it with a small military force; but this offer was unluckily rejected. Afterwards, being in the Temple when the rioters were preparing to force the gate and had fired several times, I went to the gate, opened it, and showed them a field-piece, which I was prepared to discharge in case the attack was persisted in. They were daunted, fell back, and dispersed."

Judge Burrough (says Mr. Jeaffreson, in his "Law and Lawyers") used to relate that when the Gordon Rioters besieged the Temple he and a strong body of barristers, headed by a sergeant of the Guards, were stationed in Inner Temple Lane, and that, having complete confidence in the strength of their massive gate, they spoke bravely of their desire to be fighting on the other side. At length the gate was forced. The lawyers fell into confusion and were about to beat a retreat, when the sergeant, a man of infinite humour, cried out in a magnificent voice, "Take care no gentleman fires from behind." The words struck awe into the assailants and caused the barristers to laugh. The mob, who had expected neither laughter nor armed resistance, took to flight, telling all whom they met that the bloody-minded lawyers were armed to the teeth and enjoying themselves. The Temple was saved. When these Gordon Rioters filled London with alarm, no member of the junior bar was more prosperous and popular than handsome Jack Scott, and as he walked from his house in Carey Street to the Temple, with his wife on his arm, he returned the greetings of the barristers, who, besides liking him for a good fellow, thought it prudent to be on good terms with a man sure to achieve eminence. Dilatory in his early as well as his later years, Scott left his house that morning half an hour late. Already it was known to the mob that the Templars were assembling in their college, and a cry of "The Temple! kill the lawyers!" had been raised in Whitefriars and Essex Street. Before they reached the Middle Temple gate Mr. and Mrs. Scott were assaulted more than once. The man who won Bessie Surtees from a host of rivals and carried her away against the will of her parents and the wishes of his own father, was able to protect her from serious violence. But before the beautiful creature was safe within the Temple her dress was torn, and when at length she stood in the centre of a crowd of excited and admiring barristers, her head was bare and her ringlets fell loose upon her shoulders. "The scoundrels have got your hat, Bessie," whispered John Scott; "but never mind—they have left you your hair."

In Lord Eldon's "Anecdote Book" there is another gate story amongst the notes on the Gordon Riots. "We youngsters," says the aged lawyer, "at the Temple determined that we would not remain inactive during such times; so we introduced ourselves into a troop to assist the military. We armed ourselves as well as we could, and next morning we drew up in the court ready to follow out a troop of soldiers who were on guard. When, however, the soldiers had passed through the gate it was suddenly shut in our faces, and the officer in command shouted from the other side, 'Gentlemen, I am much obliged to you for your intended assistance; but I do not choose to allow my soldiers to be shot, so I have ordered you to be locked in.'" And away he galloped.

The elder Colman decided on making the younger one a barrister; and after visits to Scotland and Switzerland, the son returned to Soho Square, and found that his father had taken for him chambers in the Temple, and entered him as a student at Lincoln's Inn, where he afterwards kept a few terms by eating oysters. Upon this Mr. Peake notes:—"The students of Lincoln's Inn keep term by dining, or pretending to dine, in the hall during the term time. Those who feed there are accommodated with wooden trenchers instead of plates, and previously to the dinner oysters are served up by way of prologue to the play. Eating the oysters, or going into the hall without eating them, if you please, and then departing to dine elsewhere, is quite sufficient for term-keeping." The chambers in King's Bench Walk were furnished with a tent-bedstead, two tables, half-a-dozen chairs, and a carpet as much too scanty for the boards as Sheridan's "rivulet of rhyme" for its "meadow of margin." To these the elder Colman added L10 worth of law books which had been given to him in his own Lincoln's Inn days by Lord Bath; then enjoining the son to work hard, the father left town upon a party of pleasure.

Colman had sent his son to Switzerland to get him away from a certain Miss Catherine Morris, an actress of the Haymarket company. This answered for a time, but no sooner had the father left the son in the Temple than he set off with Miss Morris to Gretna Green, and was there married, in 1784; and four years after, the father's sanction having been duly obtained, they were publicly married at Chelsea Church.

In the same staircase with Colman, in the Temple, lived the witty Jekyll, who, seeing in Colman's chambers a round cage with a squirrel in it, looked for a minute or two at the little animal, which was performing the same operation as a man in the treadmill, and then quietly said, "Ah, poor devil! he is going the Home Circuit;" the locality where it was uttered—the Temple—favouring this technical joke.

On the morning young Colman began his studies (December 20, 1784) he was interrupted by the intelligence that the funeral procession of the great Dr. Johnson was on its way from his late residence, Bolt Court, through Fleet Street, to Westminster Abbey. Colman at once threw down his pen, and ran forth to see the procession, but was disappointed to find it much less splendid and imposing than the sepulchral pomp of Garrick five years before.

Dr. Dibdin thus describes the Garden walks of the last century:—"Towards evening it was the fashion for the leading counsel to promenade during the summer months in the Temple Gardens. Cocked hats and ruffles, with satin small-clothes and silk stockings, at this time constituted the usual evening dress. Lord Erskine, though a great deal shorter than his brethren, somehow always seemed to take the lead, both in place and in discourse, and shouts of laughter would frequently follow his dicta."

Ugly Dunning, afterwards the famous Lord Ashburton, entered the Middle Temple in 1752, and was called four years later, in 1756. Lord Chancellor Thurlow used to describe him wittily as "the knave of clubs."

Home Tooke, Dunning, and Kenyon were accustomed to dine together, during the vacation, at a little eating-house in the neighbourhood of Chancery Lane for the sum of sevenpence-halfpenny each. "As to Dunning and myself," said Tooke, "we were generous, for we gave the girl who waited upon us a penny a piece; but Kenyon, who always knew the value of money, sometimes rewarded her with a halfpenny, and sometimes with a promise."

Blackstone, before dedicating his powers finally to the study of the law in which he afterwards became so famous, wrote in Temple chambers his "Farewell to the Muse:"—

"Lulled by the lapse of gliding floods, Cheer'd by the warbling of the woods, How blest my days, my thoughts how free, In sweet society with thee! Then all was joyous, all was young, And years unheeded roll'd along; But now the pleasing dream is o'er— These scenes must charm me now no more. Lost to the field, and torn from you, Farewell!—a long, a last adieu!

* * * * *

Then welcome business, welcome strife, Welcome the cares, the thorns of life, The visage wan, the purblind sight, The toil by day, the lamp by night, The tedious forms, the solemn prate, The pert dispute, the dull debate, The drowsy bench, the babbling hall,— For thee, fair Justice, welcome all!"

That great orator, Edmund Burke, was entered at the Middle Temple in 1747, when the heads of the Scotch rebels of 1745 were still fresh on the spikes of Temple Bar, and he afterwards came to keep his terms in 1750. In 1756 he occupied a two-pair chamber at the "Pope's Head," the shop of Jacob Robinson, the Twickenham poet's publisher, just within the Inner Temple gateway. Burke took a dislike, however, perhaps fortunately for posterity, to the calf-skin books, and was never called to the bar.

Richard Brinsley Sheridan, an Irishman even more brilliant, but unfortunately far less prudent, than Burke, entered his name in the Middle Temple books a few days before his elopement with Miss Linley.

"A wit," says Archdeacon Nares, in his pleasant book, "Heraldic Anomalies," "once chalked the following lines on the Temple gate:"—

"As by the Templars' hold you go, The horse and lamb display'd In emblematic figures show The merits of their trade.

"The clients may infer from thence How just is their profession; The lamb sets forth their innocence, The horse their expedition.

"Oh, happy Britons! happy isle! Let foreign nations say, Where you get justice without guile And law without delay."

A rival wag replied to these lively lines by the following severer ones:—

"Deluded men, these holds forego, Nor trust such cunning elves; These artful emblems tend to show Their clients—not themselves.

"'Tis all a trick; these are all shams By which they mean to cheat you: But have a care—for you're the lambs, And they the wolves that eat you.

"Nor let the thought of 'no delay' To these their courts misguide you; 'Tis you're the showy horse, and they The jockeys that will ride you."

Hare Court is said to derive its name from Sir Nicholas Hare, who was Privy Councillor to Henry VIII. the despotic, and Master of the Rolls to Queen Mary the cruel. Heaven only knows what stern decisions and anti-heretical indictments have not been drawn up in that quaint enclosure. The immortal pump, which stands as a special feature of the court, has been mentioned by the poet Garth in his "Dispensary:"—

"And dare the college insolently aim, To equal our fraternity in fame? Then let crabs' eyes with pearl for virtue try, Or Highgate Hill with lofty Pindus vie; So glowworms may compare with Titan's beams, And Hare Court pump with Aganippe's streams."

In Essex Court one solitary barber remains: his shop is the last wigwam of a departing tribe. Dick Danby's, in the cloisters, used to be famous. In his "Lives of the Chief Justices," Lord Campbell has some pleasant gossip about Dick Danby, the Temple barber. In our group of antiquities of the Temple on page 163 will be found an engraving of the existing barber's shop.

"One of the most intimate friends," he says, "I have ever had in the world was Dick Danby, who kept a hairdresser's shop under the cloisters in the Inner Temple. I first made his acquaintance from his assisting me, when a student at law, to engage a set of chambers. He afterwards cut my hair, made my bar wigs, and aided me at all times with his valuable advice. He was on the same good terms with most of my forensic contemporaries. Thus he became master of all the news of the profession, and he could tell who were getting on, and who were without a brief—who succeeded by their talents, and who hugged the attorneys—who were desirous of becoming puisne judges, and who meant to try their fortunes in Parliament—which of the chiefs was in a failing state of health, and who was next to be promoted to the collar of S.S. Poor fellow! he died suddenly, and his death threw a universal gloom over Westminster Hall, unrelieved by the thought that the survivors who mourned him might pick up some of his business—a consolation which wonderfully softens the grief felt for a favourite Nisi Prius leader."

In spite of all the great lawyers who have been nurtured in the Temple, it has derived its chief fame from the residence within its precincts of three civilians—Dr. Johnson, Goldsmith, and Charles Lamb.

Dr. Johnson came to the Temple (No. 1, Inner Temple Lane) from Gray's Inn in 1760, and left it for Johnson's Court (Fleet Street) about 1765. When he first came to the Temple he was loitering over his edition of "Shakespeare." In 1762 a pension of L300 a year for the first time made him independent of the booksellers. In 1763 Boswell made his acquaintance and visited Ursa Major in his den.

"It must be confessed," says Boswell, "that his apartments, furniture, and morning dress were sufficiently uncouth. His brown suit of clothes looked very rusty; he had on a little old shrivelled, unpowdered wig, which was too small for his head; his shirt neck and the knees of his breeches were loose, his black worsted stockings ill drawn up, and he had a pair of unbuckled shoes by way of slippers."

At this time Johnson generally went abroad at four in the afternoon, and seldom came home till two in the morning. He owned it was a bad habit. He generally had a levee of morning visitors, chiefly men of letters—Hawkesworth, Goldsmith, Murphy, Langton, Stevens, Beauclerk, &c.—and sometimes learned ladies. "When Madame de Boufflers (the mistress of the Prince of Conti) was first in England," said Beauclerk, "she was desirous to see Johnson. I accordingly went with her to his chambers in the Temple, where she was entertained with his conversation for some time. When our visit was over, she and I left him, and were got into Inner Temple Lane, when all at once I heard a voice like thunder. This was occasioned by Johnson, who, it seems, upon a little reflection, had taken it into his head that he ought to have done the honours of his literary residence to a foreign lady of quality, and, eager to show himself a man of gallantry, was hurrying down the staircase in violent agitation. He overtook us before we reached the Temple Gate, and, brushing in between me and Madame de Boufflers, seized her hand and conducted her to her coach. His dress was a rusty-brown morning suit, a pair of old shoes by way of slippers, &c. A considerable crowd of people gathered round, and were not a little struck by his singular appearance."

It was in the year 1763, while Johnson was living in the Temple, that the Literary Club was founded; and it was in the following year that this wise and good man was seized with one of those fits of hypochondria that occasionally weighed upon that great intellect. Boswell had chambers, not far from the god of his idolatry, at what were once called "Farrar's Buildings," at the bottom of Inner Temple Lane.



Charles Lamb came to 4, Inner Temple Lane, in 1809. Writing to Coleridge, the delightful humorist says:—"I have been turned out of my chambers in the Temple by a landlord who wanted them for himself; but I have got others at No. 4, Inner Temple Lane, far more commodious and roomy. I have two rooms on the third floor, and five rooms above, with an inner staircase to myself, and all new painted, &c., for L30 a year. The rooms are delicious, and the best look backwards into Hare Court, where there is a pump always going; just now it is dry. Hare Court's trees come in at the window, so that it's like living in a garden." In 1810 he says:—"The household gods are slow to come; but here I mean to live and die." From this place (since pulled down and rebuilt) he writes to Manning, who is in China:—"Come, and bring any of your friends the mandarins with you. My best room commands a court, in which there are trees and a pump, the water of which is excellent, cold—with brandy; and not very insipid without." He sends Manning some of his little books, to give him "some idea of European literature." It is in this letter that he speaks of Braham and his singing, and jokes "on titles of honour," exemplifying the eleven gradations, by which Mr. C. Lamb rose in succession to be Baron, Marquis, Duke, Emperor Lamb, and finally Pope Innocent; and other lively matters fit to solace an English mathematician self-banished to China. The same year Mary Lamb describes her brother taking to water like a hungry otter—abstaining from all spirituous liquors, but with the most indifferent result, as he became full of cramps and rheumatism, and so cold internally that fire could not warm him. It is but just to Lamb to mention that this ascetic period was brief. This same year Lamb wrote his fine essays on Hogarth and the tragedies of Shakespeare. He was already getting weary of the dull routine of official work at the India House.



Goldsmith came to the Temple, early in 1764, from Wine Office Court. It was a hard year with him, though he published "The Traveller," and opened fruitless negotiations with Dodsley and Tonson. "He took," says Mr. Forster, "rooms on the then library-staircase of the Temple. They were a humble set of chambers enough (one Jeffs, the butler of the society, shared them with him), and on Johnson's prying and peering about in them, after his short-sighted fashion flattening his face against every object he looked at, Goldsmith's uneasy sense of their deficiencies broke out. 'I shall soon be in better chambers, sir, than these,' he said. 'Nay, sir,' answered Johnson, 'never mind that—nil te quaesiveris extra.'" He soon hurried off to the quiet of Islington, as some say, to secretly write the erudite history of "Goody Two-Shoes" for Newbery. In 1765 various publications, or perhaps the money for "The Vicar," enabled the author to move to larger chambers in Garden Court, close to his first set, and one of the most agreeable localities in the Temple. He now carried out his threat to Johnson—started a man-servant, and ran into debt with his usual gay and thoughtless vanity to Mr. Filby, the tailor, of Water Lane, for coats of divers colours. Goldsmith began to feel his importance, and determined to show it. In 1766 "The Vicar of Wakefield" (price five shillings, sewed) secured his fame, but he still remained in difficulties. In 1767 he wrote The Good-Natured Man, knocked off an English Grammar for five guineas, and was only saved from extreme want by Davies employing him to write a "History of Rome" for 250 guineas. In 1767 Parson Scott (Lord Sandwich's chaplain), busily going about to negotiate for writers, describes himself as applying to Goldsmith; among others, to induce him to write in favour of the Administration. "I found him," he said, "in a miserable set of chambers in the Temple. I told him my authority; I told him that I was empowered to pay most liberally for his exertions; and—would you believe it!—he was so absurd as to say, 'I can earn as much as will supply my wants without writing for any party; the assistance you offer is therefore unnecessary to me.' And so I left him," added the Rev. Dr. Scott, indignantly, "in his garret."

On the partial success of The Good-Natured Man (January, 1768), Goldsmith, having cleared L500, broke out like a successful gambler. He purchased a set of chambers (No. 2, up two pairs of stairs, in Brick Court) for L400, squandered the remaining L100, ran in debt to his tailor, and borrowed of Mr. Bolt, a man on the same floor. He purchased Wilton carpets, blue merino curtains, chimney-glasses, book-cases, and card-tables, and, by the aid of Filby, enrobed him in a suit of Tyrian bloom, satin grain, with darker blue silk breeches, price L8 2s. 7d., and he even ventured at a more costly suit, lined with silk and ornamented with gilt buttons. Below him lived that learned lawyer, Mr. Blackstone, then poring over the fourth volume of his precious "Commentaries," and the noise and dancing overhead nearly drove him mad, as it also did a Mr. Children, who succeeded him. What these noises arose from, Mr. Forster relates in his delightful biography of the poet. An Irish merchant named Seguin "remembered dinners at which Johnson, Percy, Bickerstaff, Kelly, 'and a variety of authors of minor note,' were guests. They talked of supper-parties with younger people, as well in the London chambers as in suburban lodgings; preceded by blind-man's buff, forfeits, or games of cards; and where Goldsmith, festively entertaining them all, would make frugal supper for himself off boiled milk. They related how he would sing all kinds of Irish songs; with what special enjoyment he gave the Scotch ballad of 'Johnny Armstrong' (his old nurse's favourite); how cheerfully he would put the front of his wig behind, or contribute in any other way to the general amusement; and to what accompaniment of uncontrolled laughter he once 'danced a minuet with Mrs. Seguin.'"

In 1768 appeared "The Deserted Village." It was about this time that one of Goldy's Grub Street acquaintances called upon him, whilst he was conversing with Topham Beauclerk, and General Oglethorpe, and the fellow, telling Goldsmith that he was sorry he could not pay the two guineas he owed him, offered him a quarter of a pound of tea and half a pound of sugar as an acknowledgment. "1769. Goldsmith fell in love with Mary Horneck known as the 'Jessamy Bride.' Unfortunately he obtained an advance of L500 for his 'Natural History,' and wholly expended it when only six chapters were written." In 1771 he published his "History of England." It was in this year that Reynolds, coming one day to Brick Court, perhaps about the portrait of Goldsmith he had painted the year before, found the mercurial poet kicking a bundle, which contained a masquerade dress, about the room, in disgust at his folly in wasting money in so foolish a way. In 1772, Mr. Forster mentions a very characteristic story of Goldsmith's warmth of heart. He one day found a poor Irish student (afterwards Dr. M'Veagh M'Donnell, a well-known physician) sitting and moping in despair on a bench in the Temple Gardens. Goldsmith soon talked and laughed him into hope and spirits, then taking him off to his chambers, employed him to translate some chapters of Buffon. In 1773 She Stoops to Conquer made a great hit; but Noll was still writing at hack-work, and was deeper in debt than ever. In 1774, when Goldsmith was still grinding on at his hopeless drudge-work, as far from the goal of fortune as ever, and even resolving to abandon London life, with all its temptations, Mr. Forster relates that Johnson, dining with the poet, Reynolds, and some one else, silently reproved the extravagance of so expensive a dinner by sending away the whole second course untouched.

In March, 1774, Goldsmith returned from Edgware to the Temple chambers, which he was trying to sell, suffering from a low nervous fever, partly the result of vexation at his pecuniary embarrassments. Mr. Hawes, an apothecary in the Strand (and one of the first founders of the Humane Society), was called in; but Goldsmith insisted on taking James's fever-powders, a valuable medicine, but dangerous under the circumstances. This was Friday, the 25th. He told the doctor then his mind was not at ease, and he died on Monday, April 4th, in his forty-fifth year. His debts amounted to over L2,000. "Was ever poet so trusted before?" writes Johnson to Boswell. The staircase of Brick Court was filled with poor outcasts, to whom Goldsmith had been kind and charitable. His coffin was opened by Miss Horneck, that a lock might be cut from his hair. Burke and Reynolds superintended the funeral, Reynolds' nephew (Palmer, afterwards Dean of Cashel) being chief mourner. Hugh Kelly, who had so often lampooned the poet, was present. At five o'clock on Saturday, the 9th of April, Goldsmith was buried in the Temple churchyard. In 1837, a slab of white marble, to the kindly poet's memory, was placed in the Temple Church, and afterwards transferred to a recess of the vestry chamber. Of the poet, Mr. Forster says, "no memorial indicates the grave to the pilgrim or the stranger, nor is it possible any longer to identify the spot which received all that was mortal of the delightful writer." The present site is entirely conjectural; but it appears from the following note, communicated to us by T.C. Noble, the well-known City antiquary, that the real site was remembered as late as 1830. Mr. Noble says:—

"In 1842, after some consideration, the benchers of the Temple deciding that no more burials should take place in the churchyard, resolved to pave it over. For about fifteen years the burial-place of Dr. Goldsmith continued in obscurity; for while some would have it that the interment took place to the east of the choir, others clung to an opinion, handed down by Mr. Broome, the gardener, who stated that when he commenced his duties, about 1830, a Mr. Collett, sexton, a very old man, and a penurious one, too, employed him to prune an elder-tree which, he stated, he venerated, because it marked the site of Goldsmith's grave. The stone which has been placed in the yard, 'to mark the spot' where the poet was buried, is not the site of this tree. The tomb was erected in 1860, but the exact position of the grave has never been discovered." The engraving on page 169 shows the spot as it appeared in the autumn of that year. The old houses at the back were pulled down soon after.

Mr. Forster, alluding to Goldsmith's love for the rooks, the former denizens of the Temple Gardens, says: "He saw the rookery (in the winter deserted, or guarded only by some five or six, 'like old soldiers in a garrison') resume its activity and bustle in the spring; and he moralised, like a great reformer, on the legal constitution established, the social laws enforced, and the particular castigations endured for the good of the community, by those black-dressed and black-eyed chatterers. 'I have often amused myself,' Goldsmith remarks, 'with observing their plans of policy from my window in the Temple, that looks upon a grove where they have made a colony, in the midst of the city.'"



CHAPTER XVI.

THE TEMPLE (continued).

Fountain Court and the Temple Fountain—Ruth Pinch—L.E.L.'s Poem—Fig-tree Court—The Inner Temple Library—Paper Buildings—The Temple Gate—Guildford North and Jeffreys—Cowper, the Poet: his Melancholy and Attempted Suicide—A Tragedy in Tanfield Court—Lord Mansfield—"Mr. Murray" and his Client—Lamb's Pictures of the Temple—The Sun-dials—Porson and his Eccentricities—Rules of the Temple—Coke and his Labours—Temple Riots—Scuffles with the Alsatians—Temple Dinners—"Calling" to the Bar—The Temple Gardens—The Chrysanthemums—Sir Matthew Hale's Tree—Revenues of the Temple—Temple Celebrities.

Lives there a man with soul so dead as to write about the Temple without mentioning the little fountain in Fountain Court?—that pet and plaything of the Temple, that, like a little fairy, sings to beguile the cares of men oppressed with legal duties. It used to look like a wagoner's silver whip—now a modern writer cruelly calls it "a pert squirt." In Queen Anne's time Hatton describes it as forcing its stream "to a vast and almost incredible altitude"—it is now only ten feet high, no higher than a giant lord chancellor. Then it was fenced with palisades—now it is caged in iron; then it stood in a square—now it is in a round. But it still sparkles and glitters, and sprinkles and playfully splashes the jaunty sparrows that come to wash off the London dust in its variegated spray. It is quite careless now, however, of notice, for has it not been immortalised by the pen of Dickens, who has made it the centre of one of his most charming love scenes? It was in Fountain Court, our readers will like to remember, that Ruth Pinch—gentle, loving Ruth—met her lover, by the merest accident of course.

"There was," says Mr. Dickens, "a little plot between them that Tom should always come out of the Temple by one way, and that was past the fountain. Coming through Fountain Court, he was just to glance down the steps leading into Garden Court, and to look once all round him; and if Ruth had come to meet him, there he would see her—not sauntering, you understand (on account of the clerks), but coming briskly up, with the best little laugh upon her face that ever played in opposition to the fountain and beat it all to nothing. For, fifty to one, Tom had been looking for her in the wrong direction, and had quite given her up, while she had been tripping towards him from the first, jingling that little reticule of hers (with all the keys in it) to attract his wondering observation.

"Whether there was life enough left in the slow vegetation of Fountain Court for the smoky shrubs to have any consciousness of the brightest and purest-hearted little woman in the world, is a question for gardeners and those who are learned in the loves of plants. But that it was a good thing for that same paved yard to have such a delicate little figure flitting through it, that it passed like a smile from the grimy old houses and the worn flagstones, and left them duller, darker, sterner than before, there is no sort of doubt. The Temple fountain might have leaped up twenty feet to greet the spring of hopeful maidenhood that in her person stole on, sparkling, through the dry and dusty channels of the law; the chirping sparrows, bred in Temple chinks and crannies, might have held their peace to listen to imaginary skylarks as so fresh a little creature passed; the dingy boughs, unused to droop, otherwise than in their puny growth, might have bent down in a kindred gracefulness to shed their benedictions on her graceful head; old love-letters, shut up in iron boxes in the neighbouring offices, and made of no account among the heaps of family papers into which they had strayed, and of which in their degeneracy they formed a part, might have stirred and fluttered with a moment's recollection of their ancient tenderness, as she went lightly by. Anything might have happened that did not happen, and never will, for the love of Ruth....

"Merrily the tiny fountain played, and merrily the dimples sparkled on its sunny face. John Westlock hurried after her. Softly the whispering water broke and fell, and roguishly the dimples twinkled as he stole upon her footsteps.

"Oh, foolish, panting, timid little heart! why did she feign to be unconscious of his coming?...

"Merrily the fountain leaped and danced, and merrily the smiling dimples twinkled and expanded more and more, until they broke into a laugh against the basin's rim and vanished."

"L.E.L." (Miss Landon) has left a graceful poem on this much-petted fountain, which begins,—

"The fountain's low singing is heard on the wind, Like a melody, bringing sweet fancies to mind— Some to grieve, some to gladden; around them they cast The hopes of the morrow, the dreams of the past. Away in the distance is heard the vast sound From the streets of the city that compass it round, Like the echo of fountains or ocean's deep call; Yet that fountain's low singing is heard over all."

Fig-tree Court derived its name from obvious sources. Next to the plane, that has the strange power of sloughing off its sooty bark, the fig seems the tree that best endures London's corrupted atmosphere. Thomas Fairchild, a Hoxton gardener, who wrote in 1722 (quoted by Mr. Peter Cunningham), alludes to figs ripening well in the Rolls Gardens, Chancery Lane, and to the tree thriving in close places about Bridewell. Who can say that some Templar pilgrim did not bring from the banks of "Abana or Pharpar, rivers of Damascus," the first leafy inhabitant of inky and dusty Fig-tree Court? Lord Thurlow was living here in 1758, the year he was called to the bar, and when, it was said, he had not money enough even to hire a horse to attend the circuit.

The Inner Temple Library stands on the terrace facing the river. The Parliament Chambers and Hall, in the Tudor style, were the work of Sidney Smirke, R.A., in 1835. The library, designed by Mr. Abrahams, is 96 feet long, 42 feet wide, and 63 feet high; it has a hammer-beam roof. One of the stained glass windows is blazoned with the arms of the Templars. Below the library are chambers. The cost of the whole was about L13,000. The north window is thought to too much resemble the great window at Westminster.

Paper Buildings, a name more suitable for the offices of some City companies, were first built in the reign of James I., by a Mr. Edward Hayward and others; and the learned Dugdale describes them as eighty-eight feet long, twenty feet broad, and four storeys high. This Hayward was Selden's chamber-fellow, and to him Selden dedicated his "Titles of Honour." Selden, according to Aubrey, had chambers in these pleasant river-side buildings, looking towards the gardens, and in the uppermost storey he had a little gallery, to pace in and meditate. The Great Fire swept away Selden's chambers, and their successors were destroyed by the fire which broke out in Mr. Maule's chambers. Coming home at night from a dinner-party, that gentleman, it is said, put the lighted candle under his bed by mistake. The stately new buildings were designed by Mr. Sidney Smirke, A.R.A., in 1848. The red brick and stone harmonise pleasantly, and the overhanging oriels and angle turrets (Continental Tudor) are by no means ineffective.

The entrance to the Middle Temple from Fleet Street is a gatehouse of red brick pointed with stone, and is the work of Wren. It was erected in 1684, after the Great Fire, and is in the style of Inigo Jones—"not inelegant," says Ralph. It probably occupies the site of the gatehouse erected by order of Wolsey, at the expense of his prisoner, Sir Amyas Paulet. The frightened man covered the front with the cardinal's hat and arms, hoping to appease Wolsey's anger by gratifying his pride. The Inner Temple gateway was built in the fifth year of James I.

Elm Court was built in the sixth year of Charles I. Up one pair of stairs that successful courtier, Guildford North, whom Jeffreys so tormented by the rumour that he had been seen riding on a rhinoceros, then exhibiting in London, commenced the practice that soon won him such high honours.

In 1752 the poet Cowper, on leaving a solicitor's office, had chambers in the Middle Temple, and in that solitude the horror of his future malady began to darken over him. He gave up the classics, which had been his previous delight, and read George Herbert's poems all day long. In 1759, after his father's death, he purchased another set of rooms for L250, in an airy situation in the Inner Temple. He belonged, at this time, to the "Nonsense Club," of which Bonnell Thornton, Colman junior, and Lloyd were members. Thurlow also was his friend. In 1763 his despondency deepened into insanity. An approaching appointment to the clerkship of the Journals of the House of Lords overwhelmed him with nervous fears. Dreading to appear in public, he resolved to destroy himself. He purchased laudanum, then threw it away. He packed up his portmanteau to go to France and enter a monastery. He went down to the Custom House Quay, to throw himself into the river. He tried to stab himself. At last the poor fellow actually hung himself, and was only saved by an accident. The following is his own relation:—

"Not one hesitating thought now remained, but I fell greedily to the execution of my purpose. My garter was made of a broad piece of scarlet binding, with a sliding buckle, being sewn together at the ends. By the help of the buckle I formed a noose, and fixed it about my neck, straining it so tight that I hardly left a passage for my breath, or for the blood to circulate. The tongue of the buckle held it fast. At each corner of the bed was placed a wreath of carved work fastened by an iron pin, which passed up through the midst of it; the other part of the garter, which made a loop, I slipped over one of them, and hung by it some seconds, drawing up my feet under me, that they might not touch the floor; but the iron bent, and the carved work slipped off, and the garter with it. I then fastened it to the frame of the tester, winding it round and tying it in a strong knot. The frame broke short, and let me down again.

"The third effort was more likely to succeed. I set the door open, which reached to within a foot of the ceiling. By the help of a chair I could command the top of it, and the loop being large enough to admit a large angle of the door, was easily fixed, so as not to slip off again. I pushed away the chair with my feet; and hung at my whole length. While I hung there I distinctly heard a voice say three times, 'Tis over!' Though I am sure of the fact, and was so at the time, yet it did not at all alarm me or affect my resolution. I hung so long that I lost all sense, all consciousness of existence.

"When I came to myself again I thought I was in hell; the sound of my own dreadful groans was all that I heard, and a feeling like that produced by a flash of lightning just beginning to seize upon me, passed over my whole body. In a few seconds I found myself fallen on my face to the floor. In about half a minute I recovered my feet, and reeling and struggling, stumbled into bed again.

"By the blessed providence of God, the garter which had held me till the bitterness of temporal death was past broke just before eternal death had taken place upon me. The stagnation of the blood under one eye in a broad crimson spot, and a red circle round my neck, showed plainly that I had been on the brink of eternity. The latter, indeed, might have been occasioned by the pressure of the garter, but the former was certainly the effect of strangulation, for it was not attended with the sensation of a bruise, as it must have been had I in my fall received one in so tender a part; and I rather think the circle round my neck was owing to the same cause, for the part was not excoriated, nor at all in pain.

"Soon after I got into bed I was surprised to hear a voice in the dining-room, where the laundress was lighting a fire. She had found the door unbolted, notwithstanding my design to fasten it, and must have passed the bed-chamber door while I was hanging on it, and yet never perceived me. She heard me fall, and presently came to ask me if I was well, adding, she feared I had been in a fit.

"I sent her to a friend, to whom I related the whole affair, and dispatched him to my kinsman at the coffee-house. As soon as the latter arrived I pointed to the broken garter which lay in the middle of the room, and apprised him also of the attempt I had been making. His words were, 'My dear Mr. Cowper, you terrify me! To be sure you cannot hold the office at this rate. Where is the deputation?' I gave him the key of the drawer where it was deposited, and his business requiring his immediate attendance, he took it away with him; and thus ended all my connection with the Parliament office."



In February, 1732, Tanfield Court, a quiet, dull nook on the east side of the Temple, to the south of that sombre Grecian temple where the Master resides, was the scene of a very horrible crime. Sarah Malcolm, a laundress, aged twenty-two, employed by a young barrister named Kerrol in the same court, gaining access to the rooms of an old lady named Duncomb, whom she knew to have money, strangled her and an old servant, and cut the throat of a young girl, whose bed she had probably shared. Some of her blood-stained linen, and a silver tankard of Mrs. Duncomb's, stained with blood, were found by Mr. Kerrol concealed in his chambers. Fifty-three pounds of the money were discovered at Newgate hidden in the prisoner's hair. She confessed to a share in the robbery, but laid the murder to two lads with whom she was acquainted. She was, however, found guilty, and hung opposite Mitre Court, Fleet Street. The crowd was so great that one woman crossed from near Serjeants' Inn to the other side of the way on the shoulders of the mob. Sarah Malcolm went to execution neatly dressed in a crape gown, held up her head in the cart with an air, and seemed to be painted. A copy of her confession was sold for twenty guineas. Two days before her execution she dressed in scarlet, and sat to Hogarth for a sketch, which Horace Walpole bought for L5. The portrait represents a cruel, thin-lipped woman, not uncomely, sitting at a table. The Duke of Roxburghe purchased a perfect impression of this print, Mr. Timbs says, for L8 5s. Its original price was sixpence. After her execution the corpse was taken to an undertaker's on Snow Hill, and there exhibited for money. Among the rest, a gentleman in deep mourning—perhaps her late master, Mr. Kerrol—stooped and kissed it, and gave the attendant half-a-crown. She was, by special favour (for superiority even in wickedness has its admirers), buried in St. Sepulchre's Churchyard, from which criminals had been excluded for a century and a half. The corpse of the murderess was disinterred, and her skeleton, in a glass case, is still to be seen at the Botanic Garden, Cambridge.



Not many recorded crimes have taken place in the Temple, for youth, however poor, is hopeful. It takes time to make a man despair, and when he despairs, the devil is soon at his elbow. Nevertheless, greed and madness have upset some Templars' brains. In October, 1573, a crazed, fanatical man of the Middle Temple, named Peter Burchet, mistaking John Hawkins (afterwards the naval hero) for Sir Christopher Hatton, flew at him in the Strand, and dangerously wounded him with a dagger. The queen was so furious that at first she wanted Burchet tried by camp law; but, being found to hold heretical opinions, he was committed to the Lollards' Tower (south front of St. Paul's), and afterwards sent to the Tower. Growing still madder there, Burchet slew one of his keepers with a billet from his fire, and was then condemned to death and hung in the Strand, close by where he had stabbed Hawkins, his right hand being first stricken off and nailed to the gibbet.

In 1685 John Ayloff, a barrister of the Inner Temple, was hung for high treason opposite the Temple Gate.

In 1738 Thomas Carr, an attorney, of Elm Court, and Elizabeth Adams, his accomplice, were executed for robbing a Mr. Quarrington in Shire Lane (see page 74); and in 1752 Henry Justice, of the Middle Temple, in spite of his well-omened name, was cruelly sentenced to death for stealing books from the library of Trinity College, Cambridge, but eventually he was only transported for life.

The celebrated Earl of Mansfield, when Mr. Murray, had chambers at No. 5, King's Bench Walk, apropos of which Pope wrote—

"To Number Five direct your doves, There spread round Murray all your blooming loves."

(Pope "to Venus," from "Horace.")

A second compliment by Pope to this great man occasioned a famous parody:—

"Graced as thou art by all the power of words, So known, so honoured at the House of Lords"

(Pope, of Lord Mansfield);

which was thus cleverly parodied by Colley Cibber:

"Persuasion tips his tongue whene'er he talks, And he has chambers in the King's Bench Walks."

One of Mansfield's biographers tells us that "once he was surprised by a gentleman of Lincoln's Inn (who took the liberty of entering his room in the Temple without the ceremonious introduction of a servant), in the act of practising the graces of a speaker at a glass, while Pope sat by in the character of a friendly preceptor." Of the friendship of Pope and Murray, Warburton has said: "Mr. Pope had all the warmth of affection for this great lawyer; and, indeed, no man ever more deserved to have a poet for his friend, in the obtaining of which, as neither vanity, party, nor fear had a share, so he supported his title to it by all the offices of a generous and true friendship."

"A good story," says Mr. Jeaffreson, "is told of certain visits paid to William Murray's chambers at No. 5, King's Bench Walk, Temple, in the year 1738. Born in 1705, Murray was still a young man when, in 1738, he made his brilliant speech on behalf of Colonel Sloper, against whom Colley Cibber's rascally son had brought an action for immorality with his wife, the lovely actress, who on the stage was the rival of Mrs. Clive, and in private life was remarkable for immorality and fascinating manners. Amongst the many clients who were drawn to Murray by that speech, Sarah, Duchess of Marlborough, was neither the least powerful nor the least distinguished. Her grace began by sending the rising advocate a general retainer, with a fee of a thousand guineas, of which sum he accepted only the two-hundredth part, explaining to the astonished duchess that 'the professional fee, with a general retainer, could not be less nor more than five guineas.' If Murray had accepted the whole sum he would not have been overpaid for his trouble, for her grace persecuted him with calls at most unseasonable hours. On one occasion, returning to his chambers after 'drinking champagne with the wits,' he found the duchess's carriage and attendants on King's Bench Walk. A numerous crowd of footmen and link-bearers surrounded the coach, and when the barrister entered his chambers he encountered the mistress of that army of lackeys. 'Young man,' exclaimed the grand lady, eyeing the future Lord Mansfield with a look of displeasure, 'if you mean to rise in the world, you must not sup out.' On a subsequent night Sarah of Marlborough called without appointment at the chambers, and waited till past midnight in the hope that she would see the lawyer ere she went to bed. But Murray, being at an unusually late supper-party, did not return till her grace had departed in an overpowering rage. 'I could not make out, sir, who she was,' said Murray's clerk, describing her grace's appearance and manner, 'for she would not tell me her name; but she swore so dreadfully that I am sure she must be a lady of quality.'"

Charles Lamb, who was born in Crown Office Row, in his exquisite way has sketched the benchers of the Temple whom he had seen pacing the terrace in his youth. Jekyll, with the roguish eye, and Thomas Coventry, of the elephantine step, the scarecrow of inferiors, the browbeater of equals, who made a solitude of children wherever he came, who took snuff by palmfuls, diving for it under the mighty flap of his old-fashioned red waistcoat. In the gentle Samuel Salt we discover a portrait of the employer of Lamb's father. Salt was a shy indolent, absent man, who never dressed for a dinner party but he forgot his sword. The day of Miss Blandy's execution he went to dine with a relative of the murderess, first carefully schooled by his clerk to avoid the disagreeable subject. However, during the pause for dinner, Salt went to the window, looked out, pulled down his ruffles, and observed, "It's a gloomy day; Miss Blandy must be hanged by this time, I suppose." Salt never laughed. He was a well-known toast with the ladies, having a fine figure and person. Coventry, on the other hand, was a man worth four or five hundred thousand, and lived in a gloomy house, like a strong box, opposite the pump in Serjeants' Inn, Fleet Street. Fond of money as he was, he gave away L30,000 at once to a charity for the blind, and kept a hospitable house. Salt was indolent and careless of money, and but for Lovel, his clerk, would have been universally robbed. This Lovel was a clever little fellow, with a face like Garrick, who could mould heads in clay, turn cribbage-boards, take a hand at a quadrille or bowls, and brew punch with any man of his degree in Europe. With Coventry and Salt, Peter Pierson often perambulated the terrace, with hands folded behind him. Contemporary with these was Daines Barrington, a burly, square man. Lamb also mentions Burton, "a jolly negation," who drew up the bills of fare for the parliament chamber, where the benchers dined; thin, fragile Wharry, who used to spitefully pinch his cat's ears when anything offended him; and Jackson, the musician, to whom the cook once applied for instructions how to write down "edge-bone of beef" in a bill of commons. Then there was Blustering Mingay, who had a grappling-hook in substitute for a hand he had lost, which Lamb, when a child, used to take for an emblem of power; and Baron Mascres, who retained the costume of the reign of George II.

In his "Essays," Lamb says:—"I was born and passed the first seven years of my life in the Temple. Its church, its halls, its gardens, its fountain, its river I had almost said—for in those young years what was the king of rivers to me but a stream that watered our pleasant places?—these are of my oldest recollections. I repeat, to this day, no verses to myself more frequently or with kindlier emotion than those of Spenser where he speaks of this spot. Indeed, it is the most elegant spot in the metropolis. What a transition for a countryman visiting London for the first time—the passing from the crowded Strand or Fleet Street, by unexpected avenues, into its magnificent, ample squares, its classic green recesses! What a cheerful, liberal look hath that portion of it which, from three sides, overlooks the greater garden, that goodly pile

'Of buildings strong, albeit of paper hight,'

confronting with massy contrast, the lighter, older, more fantastically shrouded one named of Harcourt, with the cheerful Crown Office Row (place of my kindly engendure), right opposite the stately stream, which washes the garden foot with her yet scarcely trade—polluted waters, and seems but just weaned from Twickenham Naiades! A man would give something to have been born in such places. What a collegiate aspect has that fine Elizabethan hall, where the fountain plays, which I have made to rise and fall, how many times! to the astonishment of the young urchins, my contemporaries, who, not being able to guess at its recondite machinery, were almost tempted to hail the wondrous work as magic...."

"So may the winged horse, your ancient badge and cognisance, still flourish! So may future Hookers and Seldens illustrate your church and chambers! So may the sparrows, in default of more melodious quiristers, imprisoned hop about your walks! So may the fresh-coloured and cleanly nursery-maid, who by leave airs her playful charge in your stately gardens, drop her prettiest blushing curtsey as ye pass, reductive of juvenescent emotion! So may the younkers of this generation eye you, pacing your stately terrace, with the same superstitious veneration with which the child Elia gazed on the old worthies that solemnised the parade before ye!"

Charles Lamb, in his "Essay" on the old benchers, speaks of many changes he had witnessed in the Temple—i.e., the Gothicising the entrance to the Inner Temple Hall and the Library front, to assimilate them to the hall, which they did not resemble; to the removal of the winged horse over the Temple Hall, and the frescoes of the Virtues which once Italianised it. He praises, too, the antique air of the "now almost effaced sun-dials," with their moral inscriptions, seeming almost coeval with the time which they measured, and taking their revelations immediately from heaven, holding correspondence with the fountain of light. Of these dials there still remain—one in Temple Lane, with the motto, "Pereunt et imputantur;" one in Essex Court, "Vestigia nulla retrorsum;" and one in Brick Court on which Goldsmith must often have gazed—the motto, "Time and tide tarry for no man." In Pump Court and Garden Court are two dials without mottoes; and in each Temple garden is a pillar dial—"the natural garden god of Christian gardens." On an old brick house at the east end of Inner Temple Terrace, removed in 1828, was a dial with the odd inscription, "Begone about your business," words with which an old bencher is said to have once dismissed a troublesome lad who had come from the dial-maker's for a motto, and who mistook his meaning. The one we have engraved at page 180 is in Pump Court. The date and the initials are renewed every time it is fresh painted.

There are many old Temple anecdotes relating to that learned disciple of Bacchus, Porson. Many a time (says Mr. Timbs), at early morn, did Porson stagger from his old haunt, the "Cider Cellars" in Maiden Lane, where he scarcely ever failed to pass some hours, after spending the evening elsewhere. It is related of him, upon better authority than most of the stories told to his discredit, that one night, or rather morning, Gurney (the Baron), who had chambers in Essex Court under Porson's, was awakened by a tremendous thump in the chamber above. Porson had just come home dead drunk, and had fallen on the floor. Having extinguished the candle in the fall, he presently staggered downstairs to re-light it, and Gurney heard him dodging and poking with the candle at the staircase lamp for about five minutes, and all the time very lustily cursing the nature of things.

We read also of Porson's shutting himself up in these chambers for three or four days together, admitting no visitor. One morning his friend Rogers went to call, having ascertained from the barber's hard by that Porson was at home, but had not been seen by any one for two days. Rogers proceeded to his chambers, and knocked at the door more than once; he would not open it, and Rogers came downstairs, but as he was crossing the court Porson opened the window and stopped him. He was then busy about the Grenville "Homer," for which he collated the Harleian MS. of the "Odyssey," and received for his labour but L50 and a large-paper copy. His chambers must have presented a strange scene, for he used books most cruelly, whether they were his own or belonged to others. He said that he possessed more bad copies of good books than any private gentleman in England.

Rogers, when a Templar, occasionally had some visitors who absorbed more of his time than was always agreeable; an instance of which he thus relates: "When I lived in the Temple, Mackintosh and Richard Sharp used to come to my chambers and stay there for hours, talking metaphysics. One day they were so intent on their 'first cause,' 'spirit,' and 'matter,' that they were unconscious of my having left them, paid a visit, and returned. I was a little angry at this; and to show my indifference about them, I sat down and wrote letters, without taking any notice of them. I never met a man with a fuller mind than Mackintosh—such readiness on all subjects, such a talker."

Before any person can be admitted a member of the Temple, he must furnish a statement in writing, describing his age, residence, and condition in life, and adding a certificate of his respectability and fitness, signed by himself and a bencher of the society, or two barristers. The Middle Temple requires the signatures of two barristers of that Inn and of a bencher, but in each of the three other Inns the signatures of barristers of any of the four Inns will suffice. No person is admitted without the approbation of a bencher, or of the benchers in council assembled.

The Middle Temple includes the universities of Durham and London. At the Inner Temple the candidate for admission who has taken the degree of B.A., or passed an examination at the Universities of Oxford, Cambridge, or London, is required to pass an examination by a barrister, appointed by the Bench for that purpose, in the Greek and Latin languages, and history or literature in general. No person in priest's or deacon's orders can be called to the bar. In the Inner Temple, an attorney must have ceased to be on the rolls, and an articled clerk to be in articles for three years, before he can be called to the bar.

Legal students worked hard in the old times; Coke's career is an example. In 1572 he rose every morning at five o'clock, lighting his own fire; and then read Bracton, Littleton, and the ponderous folio abridgments of the law till the court met, at eight o'clock. He then took boat for Westminster, and heard cases argued till twelve o'clock, when the pleas ceased for dinner. After a meal in the Inner Temple Hall, he attended "readings" or lectures in the afternoon, and then resumed his private studies till supper-time at five. Next came the moots, after which he slammed his chamber-door, and set to work with his commonplace book to index all the law he had amassed during the day. At nine, the steady student went to bed, securing three good hours of sleep before midnight. It is said Coke never saw a play or read a play in his life—and that was Shakespeare's time! In the reign of James I. the Temple was often called "my Lord Coke's shop." He had become a great lawyer then, and lived to become Lord Chief Justice. Pity 'tis that we have to remember that he reviled Essex and insulted Raleigh. King James once said of Coke in misfortune that he was like a cat, he always fell on his feet.

History does not record many riots in the Temple, full of wild life as that quiet precinct has been. In different reigns, however, two outbreaks occurred. In both cases the Templars, though rather hot and prompt, seem to have been right. At the dinner of John Prideaux, reader of the Inner Temple, in 1553, the students took offence at Sir John Lyon, the Lord Mayor, coming in state, with his sword up, and the sword was dragged down as he passed through the cloisters. The same sort of affray took place again in 1669, when Lord Mayor Peake came to Sir Christopher Goodfellow's feast, and the Lord Mayor had to be hidden in a bencher's chambers till, as Pepys relates, the fiery young sparks were decoyed away to dinner. The case was tried before Charles II., and Heneage Finch pleaded for the Temple, claiming immemorial exemption from City jurisdiction. The case was never decided. From that day to this (says Mr. Noble) a settlement appears never to have been made; hence it is that the Temples claim to be "extra parochial," closing nightly all their gates as the clock strikes ten, and keeping extra watch and ward when the parochial authorities "beat the bounds" upon Ascension Day. Many struggles have taken place to make the property rateable, and even of late the question has once more arisen; and it is hardly to be wondered at, for it would be a nice bit of business to assess the Templars upon the L32,866 which they have returned as the annual rental of their estates.

A third riot was with those ceaseless enemies of the Templars, the Alsatians, or lawless inhabitants of disreputable Whitefriars. In July, 1691, weary of their riotous and thievish neighbours, the benchers of the Inner Temple bricked up the gate (still existing in King's Bench Walk) leading into the high street of Whitefriars; but the Alsatians, swarming out, pulled down as fast as the bricklayers built up. The Templars hurried together, swords flew out, the Alsatians plied pokers and shovels, and many heads were broken. Ultimately, two men were killed, several wounded, and many hurried off to prison. Eventually, the ringleader of the Alsatians, Captain Francis White—a "copper captain," no doubt—was convicted of murder, in April, 1693. This riot eventually did good, for it led to the abolition of London sanctuaries, those dens of bullies, low gamblers, thieves, and courtesans.

As the Middle Temple has grown gradually poorer and more neglected, many curious customs of the old banquets have died out. The loving cup, once fragrant with sweetened sack, is now used to hold the almost superfluous toothpicks. Oysters are no longer brought in, in term, every Friday before dinner; nor when one bencher dines does he, on leaving the hall, invite the senior bar man to come and take wine with him in the parliament chamber (the accommodation-room of Oxford colleges). Yet the rich and epicurean Inner Temple still cherishes many worthy customs, affects recherche French dishes, and is curious in entremets; while the Middle Temple growls over its geological salad, that some hungry wit has compared to "eating a gravel walk, and meeting an occasional weed." A writer in Blackwood, quoting the old proverb, "The Inner Temple for the rich, the Middle for the poor," says few great men have come from the Middle Temple. How can acumen be derived from the scrag-end of a neck of mutton, or inspiration from griskins? At a late dinner, says Mr. Timbs (1865), there were present only three benchers, seven barristers, and six students.

An Inner Temple banquet is a very grand thing. At five, or half-past five, the barristers and students in their gowns follow the benchers in procession to the dais; the steward strikes the table solemnly a mystic three times, grace is said by the treasurer, or senior bencher present, and the men of law fall to. In former times it was the custom to blow a horn in every court to announce the meal, but how long this ancient Templar practice has been discontinued we do not know. The benchers observe somewhat more style at their table than the other members do at theirs. The general repast is a tureen of soup, a joint of meat, a tart, and cheese, to each mess, consisting of four persons, and each mess is allowed a bottle of port wine. Dinner is served daily to the members of the Inn during term time; the masters of the Bench dining on the state, or dais, and the barristers and students at long tables extending down the hall. On grand days the judges are present, who dine in succession with each of the four Inns of Court. To the parliament chamber, adjoining the hall, the benchers repair after dinner. The loving cups used on certain grand occasions are huge silver goblets, which are passed down the table, filled with a delicious composition, immemorially termed "sack," consisting of sweetened and exquisitely-flavoured white wine. The butler attends the progress of the cup, to replenish it; and each student is by rule restricted to a sip; yet it is recorded that once, though the number present fell short of seventy, thirty-six quarts of the liquid were sipped away. At the Inner Temple, on May 29th, a gold cup of sack is handed to each member, who drinks to the happy restoration of Charles II.



The writer in Blackwood before referred to alludes to the strict silence enjoined at the Inner Temple dinners, the only intercourse between the several members of the mess being the usual social scowl vouchsafed by your true-born Englishman to persons who have not the honour of his acquaintance. You may, indeed, on an emergency, ask your neighbour for the salt; but then it is also perfectly understood that he is not obliged to notice your request.

The old term of "calling to the bar" seems to have originated in the custom of summoning students, that had attained a certain standing, to the bar that separated the benchers' dais from the hall, to take part in certain probationary mootings or discussions on points of law. The mere student sat farthest from the bar.

When these mootings were discontinued deponent sayeth not. In Coke's time (1543), that great lawyer, after supper at five o'clock, used to join the moots, when questions of law were proposed and discussed, when fine on the garden terrace, in rainy weather in the Temple cloisters. The dinner alone now remains; dining is now the only legal study of Temple students.

In the Middle Temple a three years' standing and twelve commons kept suffices to entitle a gentleman to be called to the bar, provided he is above twenty-three years of age. No person can be called to the bar at any of the Inns of Court before he is twenty-one years of age; and a standing of five years is understood to be required of every member before being called. The members of the several universities, &c., may, however, be called after three years' standing.



The Inner Temple Garden (three acres in extent) has probably been a garden from the time the white-mantled Templars first came from Holborn and settled by the river-side. This little paradise of nurserymaids and London children is entered from the terrace by an iron gate (date, 1730); and the winged horse that surmounts the portal has looked down on many a distinguished visitor. In the centre of the grass is such a sun-dial as Charles Lamb loved, with the date, 1770. A little to the east of this stands an old sycamore, which, fifteen years since, was railed in as the august mummy of that umbrageous tree under whose shade, as tradition says, Johnson and Goldsmith used to sit and converse. According to an engraving of 1671 there were formerly three trees; so that Shakespeare himself may have sat under them and meditated on the Wars of the Roses. The print shows a brick terrace faced with stone, with a flight of steps at the north. The old river wall of 1670 stood fifty or sixty yards farther north than the present; and when Paper Buildings were erected, part of this wall was dug up. The view given on this page, and taken from an old view in the Temple, shows a portion of the old wall, with the doorway opening upon the Temple Stairs.

The Temple Garden, half a century since, was famous for its white and red roses (the Old Provence, Cabbage, and the Maiden's Blush—Timbs); and the lime-trees were delightful in the time of bloom. There were only two steamboats on the river then; but the steamers and factory smoke soon spoiled everything but the hardy chrysanthemums. However, since the Smoke Consuming Act has been enforced, the roses, stocks, and hawthorns have again taken heart, and blossom with grateful luxuriance. In 1864 Mr. Broome, the zealous gardener of the Inner Temple, exhibited at the Central Horticultural Society twenty-four trusses of roses grown under his care. In the flower-beds next the main walk he managed to secure four successive crops of flowers—the pompones were especially gaudy and beautiful; but his chief triumph were the chrysanthemums of the northern border. The trees, however, seem delicate, and suffering from the cold winds, dwindle as they approach the river. The planes, limes, and wych elms stand best. The Temple rooks—the wise birds Goldsmith delighted to watch—were originally brought by Sir William Northcote from Woodcote Green, Epsom, but they left in disgust, many years since. Mr. Timbs says that 200 families enjoy these gardens throughout the year, and about 10,000 of the outer world, chiefly children, who are always in search of the lost Eden, come hers annually. The flowers and trees are rarely injured, thanks to the much-abused London public.

In the secluded Middle Temple Garden is an old catalpa tree, supposed to have been planted by that grave and just judge, Sir Matthew Hale. On the lawn is a large table sun-dial, elaborately gilt and embellished. From the library oriel the Thames and its bridges, Somerset House and the Houses of Parliament, form a grand coup d'oeil.

The revenue of the Middle Temple alone is said to be L13,000 a year. With the savings we are, of course, entirely ignorant. The students' dinners are half paid for by themselves, the library is kept up on very little fodder, and altogether the system of auditing the Inns of Court accounts is as incomprehensible as the Sybilline oracles; but there can be no doubt it is all right, and very well managed.

In the seventeenth century (says Mr. Noble) a benevolent member of the Middle Temple conveyed to the benchers in fee several houses in the City, out of the rents of which to pay a stated salary to each of two referees, who were to meet on two days weekly, in term, from two to five, in the hall or other convenient place, and without fee on either side, to settle as best they could all disputes submitted to them. From that time the referees have been appointed, but there is no record of a single case being tried by them. The two gentlemen, finding their office a sinecure, have devoted their salaries to making periodical additions to the library. May we be allowed to ask, was this benevolent object ever made known to the public generally? We cannot but think, if it had been, that the two respected arbitrators would not have had to complain of the office as a sinecure.

He who can enumerate the wise and great men who have been educated in the Temple can count off the stars on his finger and measure the sands of the sea-shore by teacupsful. To cull a few, we may mention that the Inner Temple boasts among its eminent members—Audley, Chancellor to Henry VIII.; Nicholas Hare, of Hare Court celebrity; the great lawyer, Littleton (1481), and Coke, his commentator; Sir Christopher Hatton, the dancing Chancellor; Lord Buckhurst; Selden; Judge Jeffries; Beaumont, the poet; William Browne, the author of "Britannia's Pastorals" (so much praised by the Lamb and Hazlitt school); Cowper, the poet; and Sir William Follett.

From the Middle Temple have also sprung swarms of great lawyers. We may mention specially Plowden, the jurist, Sir Walter Raleigh, Sir Thomas Overbury (who was poisoned in the Tower), John Ford (one of the latest of the great dramatists), Sir Edward Bramston (chamber-fellow to Mr. Hyde, afterwards Lord Clarendon), Bulstrode Whitelocke (one of Cromwell's Ministers), Lord-Keeper Guildford (Charles II.), Lord Chancellor Somers, Wycherley and Congreve (the dramatists), Shadwell and Southern (comedy writers), Sir William Blackstone, Edmund Burke, Sheridan, Dunning (Lord Ashburton), Lord Chancellor Eldon, Lord Stowell, as a few among a multitude.