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Shall send, between the red rose and the white,
A thousand souls to death and deadly night.

First Part of Henry VI., Act ii. Sc. 4.

It would be impossible to revive the scene in the supposed place of its origin, for such is the smoke and foul air of London that the commonest and hardiest kind of rose has long ceased to put forth a bud in the Temple Gardens, but these gardens have become the home of the chrysanthemum, and every year a fine exhibition of these flowers is to be seen here. The Temple is walled in on every side, and protected with gates. There is no poor-law within its precinct. [See Inner Temple Lane; Middle Temple Lane; King's Bench Walk ; Paper Buildings; Hare Court; Elm Court; Ram Alley; Crown Office Row; Fig Tree Court; Brick Court.]

THE INNER TEMPLE is an Inn of Court, with three Inns of Chancery attached-Clifford's Inn, Clement's Inn, and Lyon's Inn, the latter now cleared away. The Gate House in Fleet Street, erected 5th of King James I., carries the feathers of Henry, Prince of Wales, eldest son of James 1., in relief upon the front. It is now a hairdresser's, and is thus erroneously inscribed: "Formerly the Palace of Henry VIII. and Cardinal Wolsey." The greater part of the Inner Temple was destroyed in the Great Fire of 1666, the flames stopping within a very few yards of the Temple Church.

Eminent Members.-Littleton (the famous judge). Sir Edward Coke. Sir Christopher Hatton. Lord Buckhurst (Lord High Treasurer). John Bradford ("But for the grace of God, there goes John Bradford "), admitted 1547. John Selden ("a long scabby-poled boy, but a good student," as Sir Giles Mompesson told Aubrey), removed from Clifford's Inn to the Inner Temple in May 1604. His chambers were in Paper Buildings [which see]. He was elected a Bencher in 1632. When he died in 1654 his executors wished to present his library to the Society, and with that view lodged it in some chambers in the King's Bench Walk, where it remained for five years without any arrangement being made for receiving it. It was then bestowed upon the Bodleian Library and welcomed with all due honour. Heneage Finch, Judge Jeffreys, Francis Beaumont (Beaumont and Fletcher), Lord Mansfield, William Browne (author of Britannia's Pastorals), William Cowper (the poet). The hall, a poor mock Gothic building as "restored" in 1816, was demolished in 1869, and the present more spacious hall erected in its place from the designs of Sydney Smirke, R.A. This is a substantial structure of Portland stone, Perpendicular in style, 94 feet long, 41 feet wide, and 40 feet high to the wall plate, and has an open oak roof resembling that of Westminster Hall. The fine oriel at the upper end is filled with heraldic painted glass. Under the north end is an ancient crypt, which has been carefully restored. In olden times the Inner Temple Hall was famous for its revels and banquets. The revels are over but the banquets are still given, and on Grand Days with much state and

ceremony. When Sir Heneage Finch, afterwards Lord Chancellor Nottingham, was Reader of the Society of the Inner Temple, King Charles II. dined with him in Inner Temple Hall; an honour, it is said, never before granted by a King in this country. The last Reader who read was Sir William Whitelocke in 1684.1

The last revel in any of the Inns of Court was in the Inner Temple, held in honour of Mr. Talbot, when he took leave of that house, of which he was a bencher, on having the Great Seal delivered to him. A friend, who was present during the whole entertainment, obliged me with the following account, which, with some circumstances supplied by another gentleman then likewise present, seemed worth adding here, by way of comparison with those in former times, and as it may probably be the last of the kind:—

"On the 2nd of February, 1733, the Lord Chancellor came into the Inner Temple Hall about two of the clock, preceded by the Master of the Revels (Mr. Wollaston), and followed by the Master of the Temple (Dr. Sherlock), then Bishop of Bangor, and by the Judges and Serjeants who had been members of that house. There was a very elegant dinner provided for them and the Lord Chancellor's officers; but the Barristers and Students of the house had no other dinner got for them than what is usual on all Grand Days; but each mess had a flask of claret, besides the common allowance of port and sack. Fourteen students waited on the Bench Table, among whom was Mr. Talbot, the Lord Chancellor's eldest son; and by their means any sort of provision was easily obtained from the upper table by those at the rest. A large gallery was built over the screen, and was filled with ladies, who came, for the most part, a considerable time before the dinner began ; and the music was placed in the little gallery, at the upper end of the Hall, and played all dinner time.

"As soon as dinner was ended the play began, which was Love for Love, with the farce of The Devil To Pay. The actors who performed in them all came from the Haymarket, in chairs, ready dressed; and, as it was said, refused any gratuity for the trouble, looking upon the honour of distinguishing themselves on this occasion as sufficient.

"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 fireplace (but no fire nor embers were on 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 60; 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, which they continued as long as they pleased; and the whole day's entertainment was generally thought to be very genteelly and liberally conducted. 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."-Wynne's Eunomus, ed. 1774, vol. iv. p. 104.

It was at a banquet at the Inner Temple Hall (July 6, 1846) that

1 Pegge's Curialia Misc., p. 236.

Brougham stole a famous joke of Dr. Arbuthnot's, and while eulogising Lyndhurst said, in allusion to Lord Campbell's presence, that "to an expiring Chancellor, Death was now armed with a new terror." Samuel Rogers had chambers in Paper Buildings [which see]. The reader will not forget Charles Lamb's delightful essay on "The Old Benchers of the Inner Temple," the Inner Temple itself, "the most elegant spot in the metropolis," with its hall and library, garden, terrace, and fountain. THE MIDDLE TEMPLE is an Inn of Court, with two Inns of Chancery attached-New Inn and Strand Inn. The former alone remains. The entrance from Fleet Street is by a heavy red brick front with stone dressings, built in 1684, from the design of Sir Christopher Wren, in place of the old portal which Sir Amias Paulet, while Wolsey's prisoner in the gate-house of the Temple, "had re-edified very sumptuously; garnishing the same," says Cavendish, "on the outside thereof, with cardinal's hats and arms, and divers other devices, in so glorious a sort, that he thought thereby to have appeased his old unkind displeasure."

He [Wolsey] layed a fine upon Sir Amias to build the gate of the Middle Temple; the arms of Pawlet with the quarterings are in glass there to this day [1680]. The Cardinall's armes were, as the storie sayes, on the outside in stone, but time has long since defaced that, only you may still discerne the place; it was carv'd in a very mouldering stone.-Aubrey's Lives, vol. iii. p. 588.

The great hall of the Society, known as "Middle Temple Hall," was built in 1572, while Plowden, the well known jurist, was treasurer of the Inn. It is 100 feet long, 42 feet wide, and 47 feet high, and is one of the best specimens of an Elizabethan hall we possess. The roof, put up in 1575, open hammer-beam design with pendants, is the best Elizabethan roof in London. The screen, a very rich piece of Renaissance work, is said to have been formed in exact imitation of the Strand front of old Somerset House, but this is a vulgar error, like the tradition which relates that it was made of the spoils of the Spanish Armada, the records of the Society proving that it was set up thirteen years before the Armada put to sea. Observe.-Busts of Lords Eldon and Stowell, by Behnes. The portraits are chiefly copies, and not good. The exterior was dressed with stone, in wretched taste, in 1757. We first hear of Shakespeare's Twelfth Night in connection with this fine old hall, a student of the Middle Temple, of the name of Manningham, making the following entry in his diary :—

February 2, 1601 [1601-1602].—At our feast we had a play called Twelve Night or what you will. Much like the Comedy of Errors; or Menechmi in Plautus; but most like and neere to that in Italian, called Inganni.-Harl. MS., 5353. Sir John Davies, the poet, whose Nosce Teipsum forms one of the glories of Queen Elizabeth's reign, was expelled the Society of the Middle Temple for thrashing his friend, Mr. Richard Martin (d. 1618), also a member of the Inn, during dinner-time, in the Middle Temple Hall. Davies was afterwards, on proper submission, re-admitted, and Martin is still remembered, not by his thrashing, but by Ben Jonson's noble dedication to him of his Poetaster. It deserves to be mentioned,

in illustration of the revels at Christmas, which used to be held in the halls of the Inns of Court, that in taking up the floor of the Middle Temple Hall, about the year 1764, near one hundred pair of dice were found, which had dropt, on different occasions, through the chinks or joints of the boards. The dice were very small, at least one third less than those now in use. Members of this Inn are summoned to dinner during Term by sounding a horn.

Prince Henry. Jack, meet me to-morrow in the Temple Hall.

Shakespeare, First Part of Henry IV., Act iii. Sc. I.

On Thursday, the 10th day of July, 1623, after our supper in the Middle Temple Hall ended, with another utter-barrister I argued a moot at the bench to the great satisfaction of such as heard me. Two gentlemen under the bar arguing at first in law French, bareheaded, as I did myself before I was called to the bar at the cupboard.-D'Ewes, vol. i. p. 232.

On Wensday the 23 of Febru. 1635, the Prince d'Amours gave a masque to the Prince Elector and his brother in the Middle Temple, wher the Queene [Henrietta Maria] was pleasd to grace the entertaynment, by putting of [off] majesty to putt on a citizen's habitt, and to sett upon the scaffold on the right hand amongst her subjects.-Sir H. Herbert (Shak. by Boswell, vol. iii. p. 237).

Manly. I hate this place [Westminster Hall] worse than a man that has inherited a Chancery Suit.

Freeman. Methinks 'tis like one of their halls in Christmas time, whither from all parts fools bring their money to try by the dice (not the worst judges) whether it shall be their own or no.-Wycherley, The Plain Dealer, 4to, 1676.

The Middle Temple Library, erected from the designs of Mr. H. R. Abraham, was opened by the Prince of Wales, October 31, 1861, on which occasion his Royal Highness was called to the Bar and admitted a Bencher of the Middle Temple. The Library is Collegiate Gothic in style, and a good building, but looks short and stilted from there being two floors of offices beneath the great hall. This, the Library proper, is a handsome room 86 feet long (with on oriel of 10 feet), 42 feet wide, and 63 feet high. It has seven tall windows on each side, a bay of five lights, overlooking the Thames, and a large window of seven lights on the north filled with heraldic glass. The open timber roof is after the model of that of Westminster Hall. The regulations for admission, call to the Bar, etc., are similar to those of the other Inns of Court. [See Inns of Court.]

Eminent Members.-Plowden; Sir Walter Raleigh (who calls himself "Walter Rawely of the Middle Temple" in his "Commendation" of Gascoigne's Steele Glas, circ. 1570); Sir Thomas Overbury; Sir John Davies, the poet; John Ford, the dramatist (admitted November 16, 1602); John Pym (admitted April 23, 1602); Lord Chancellor Clarendon (admitted in 1625, when his uncle, Sir Nicholas Hyde, was treasurer); Bulstrode Whitelocke; Ireton (Cromwell's son-in-law); Evelyn (admitted February 13, 1636); John Aubrey, the antiquary (admitted 1646); Lord Keeper Guildford (admitted November 27, 1655); Lord Chancellor Somers; Wycherley; Shadwell; Congreve ; Elias Ashmole, the antiquary (called to the bar, November 2, 1660); Southerne; Edmund Burke; R. B. Sheridan; Sir William Blackstone;

Dunning Lord Ashburton (d. 1783); Lord Chancellor Eldon; Lord Stowell; Thomas Moore, the poet; Sir Henry Havelock, the Indian hero, was a fellow-pupil with Judge Talfourd in Chitty's chambers in the Middle Temple.

Temple Bar, a gateway of Portland stone which, until 1878, separated the Strand from Fleet Street. The first mention of Temple Bar occurs in 1301 in a grant of land in the parish of St. Clement Danes, extra Barram Novi Templi. At that time the gate of the City was Ludgate, and the bar or chain put up at the end of Fleet Street by the Knights Templars marked the boundary of the territory under the control of the City, but without its walls. As the City increased in population the space within the walls became too limited, and these extra-mural lands were put under the control of the ward which they adjoined; hence the without and within added to the names of certain of the wards.

Temple Bar is the place where the freedom of the City of London and the Liberty of the City of Westminster doth part: which separation was anciently only Posts, Rails and a Chain; such as now are at Holbourn, Smithfield and Whitechapel Bars. Afterwards there was a House of Timber, erected cross the street, with a narrow gateway, and an entry on the south side of it under the house.-Strype, B. iii. p. 278. The gate, described by Strype, of which a drawing is given in Hollar's seven-sheet Map of London, was taken down after the Great Fire, and a new Bar erected 1670-1672 from the designs of Sir Christopher Wren. On the east side, in niches, were the statues of King James I. and his Queen, Anne of Denmark, and on the west side those of Charles I. and Charles II., all by John Bushnell, who died in 1701. This gate was removed in the winter of 1878-1879, and the stones (about 1000) remained exposed to the weather for ten years. The work of re-erecting Temple Bar at the entrance to Sir Henry B. Meux's private grounds, Theobalds, Waltham Cross, was completed December 3, 1888. There was an old custom connected with Temple Bar which deserves mention. The gates were invariably closed by the City authorities whenever the Sovereign had occasion to enter the City. A herald sounded a trumpet before the gate— another herald knocked—a parley ensued-the gates were then thrown open, and the Lord Mayor for the time being made over the sword of the City to the Sovereign, who graciously returned it to the Mayor. Stow describes in his Annales a scene like this, when Queen Elizabeth was on her way to St. Paul's to return thanks for the defeat of the Armada.

When Cromwell and the Parliament dined in the City in state, on June 7, 1649, the same ceremony was observed; the Mayor, says Whitelocke, delivering up the sword to the Speaker, "as he used to do to the King." The last observance of this ceremony was on February 27, 1872, when Queen Victoria went to St. Paul's to the Thanksgiving Service for the recovery of the Prince of Wales from typhoid fever.

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