myles. The country round about verie fruitfull of corne and cattell, yieldinge besides plentifull store of firewood and turfe-a very good and sweet fewell; and if the statute aforesaid for the setting open of weares and fishing places in the Boyne were executed the fewell, in greater quantitie for small pryce, might be brought down by boate.

'Lastly (which is a matter of greater ymportance), the towne is in the myddest of the Englishe Pale, and is well and strongly walled about; a thinge that will be a meane to draw lerned men thither, and be a greater safety to the whole company of studentes there; for your honour knoweth that wheresoever the Universitie be founded, the town must of necessitie have a good wall, elles will no lerned men goe from hence, or any other place thither; neither they of the country send their sonnes to any place that is not defensible, and safe from the invasion of the Irishe. The building of the wall will cost as much as the colledges, which charge will be saved.'

It will be noted that this memorial was presented to Lord Burghley in 1584, that is, within some seven or eight years of the foundation of Trinity College on its present site in Dublin.

At first sight it may appear anomalous that a country town like Trim should be seriously proposed as the home of the new university about to be established in Ireland. But a little reflection will show that the idea was not so far-fetched.

At that time, the end of the sixteenth century, there were only two universities in England, both of which were at a distance from London-Oxford 63 and Cambridge 55 miles.1 What more natural, therefore, when there was serious question of setting up a university in Ireland, than that the example of England should be followed, and that a suitable town, not too far from the capital, should be fixed on?

Of course, it may be said that the four universities at that time existing in Scotland had their homes in St. Andrews, Glasgow, Aberdeen, and Edinburgh. Still the new university for Ireland was to be founded by the Queen of England; and England was naturally taken as a model.

Much, then, could be said for the proposal put forward by the Parson of Trim in his memorial to Lord Burghley. And doubtless the author, in drawing up his memorial in favour of Trim, was encouraged in his design by knowledge of the fact that, in the previous century, Drogheda, a country town like Trim, had been similarly suggested as the site for an Irish university. For this we have the authority of

1 Durham was not founded till 1831, and London till 1836. The other universities in England and Wales are of quite recent foundation.

Leland,1 He tells us: 'It was enacted by an Irish Parliament in the year 1465, that an university should be established in the town of Drogheda, with the same liberties and privileges enjoyed by that of Oxford. But this, like other acts of Irish legislation, was totally disregarded and forgotten in the tumult of civil affairs.'

As things turned out, the claim of Trim to be the seat of a university was ignored, but the project of founding an Irish university materialized, and the site selected was the old Monastery of All Hallows, Dublin, where the university, known as Trinity College, continues to the present day.

The date of the charter was 1591. It will thus be seen that the Parson of Trim, though he failed in what, we may assume, was his main object-to make his parish the home of a great university-had read the signs of the time aright when he drew up his memorial in 1584, and presented it to Lord Burghley, who, in the charter, was named as the first chancellor of the new university.

Trinity College is now in the very heart of the capital; but at the time of its foundation it was ' in the neighbourhood of Dublin, near to the south-eastern shore.' On a map of Dublin, dated 1610, the College is shown standing alone, and well outside the city walls. There are absolutely no houses or buildings of any sort to the north, east, or south, and few to the west. Dame Street did not exist.

Between the gates of the sixteenth-century College and the castellated walls of Dublin lay the Green [known as Hoggin Green], upon which swine and cattle grazed, interfering with the comfort and security of pedestrians, hardly less than the sturdy beggars whose appeal for alms was liable by night to be associated with violence. A stream crossed the common, upon which there were then no buildings save a few cottages, to which early in the seventeenth century were added a hospital and a bridewell.3

In these circumstances, aloofness from the life and turmoil of the capital was, in the early days, at least, of the new university, to some extent provided for; but, how different are things to-day! Aloofness from city life is the last thing that would suggest itself to a stranger standing in front of Trinity College, and certainly such aloofness does not appear to prevail inside the walls.

1 The History of Ireland from the Invasion of Henry II. By Thomas Leland, D.D., Senior Fellow of Trinity College. Book iv. Ch. 3, p. 319. Printed by Brett Smith, 46 Mary Street, Dublin. 1814.

2 Leland. Book iv. Ch. 3, p. 324.

3 Trinity College, Dublin. By W. Macneille Dixon, pp. 12, 13. London: Robinson & Co., Great Russell Street. 1902.

The following words of the memorial form a significant comment on the spirit that animated the writer a spirit that would not have found expression in a memorial to Lord Burghley if it had not been the predominating spirit of the English of the Pale-Neither [will] they of the country send their sonnes to any place that is not defensible, and safe from the invasion of the Irishe.'

The new university then was not intended for the native Irish. Access to it was denied to them. In the words of the memorial, their coming to it would be treated as an 'invasion.' The Irish were naturally lovers of learning, but the policy of the English was to keep learning beyond their reach.

The following passage from Douglas Hyde's Literary History of Ireland (pp. 560-561), relating to the end of the sixteenth century, testifies to this :

Loud and bitter were the complaints of the Irish at the policy of the English Government in cutting them off from education. Peter Lombard, the Catholic Archbishop of Armagh, who died in 1625, and who wrote in Latin and published-of course abroad, he would not well do it at home— a' Commentary on the Kingdom of Ireland,' assures his countrymen and all Europe that it had been the steady plan of the English Government to cut off education from the Irish, and to prevent them having a university of their own, despite the keen longing which his countrymen had for liberal studies, and the way in which they had always hitherto distinguished themselves in them. Even, he asserts, while England was still Catholic, her policy had been the same, and when the question of an Irish university was being debated in the English Council it had no bitterer enemy than a celebrated Catholic bishop. When someone afterwards remonstrated with this dignitary for opposing a work so holy and so salutary as the establishment of a Catholic university in Ireland, the answer made him was that it was not as a Catholic bishop he opposed it, but as an English senator. Well for him,' remarks Lombard grimly, 'if in the council of God and His saints, when the severe sentence of the Deity is passed upon the bishop, the senator by a like display of nimble wit may escape it.'

When the university so long and so anxiously sought for, was actually founded, most capacious, most splendid.' as Lombard puts it, at their expense, in the shape of Trinity College, Dublin, and they found themselves excluded from its benefits, their indignation, as expressed by Lombard and others, knew no bounds. But their indignation was of little use, because they could not back it with their arms, and when they did so, they were beaten by Cromwell, and their last state rendered twenty times worse than their first.1

1 The original Latin text of these passages is given in notes on pages 561562 of Douglas Hyde's Literary History of Ireland, from Lombard's 'De Hibernia Commentarius,' Louvain, 1632.

The picture of Trim as presented to us in the memorial of the Parson of Trim is the picture of a town that, for its size, had many attractions. It was situated on the undulating, fertile plains of Meath. It had the clear waters of the River Boyne flowing through it. It had both inside and outside its walls the ruins of many buildings that were, and still are, of historical or ecclesiastical interest. It was almost within view of the royal hill of Tara. No wonder that, in 1584, and, judged by the standard of life and thought of that time, it appeared to its Parson, and to some others, well fitted to become the Oxford of Ireland.

One who is inclined to ruminate on the past cannot but think how different Trim of the present day would be if the proposal of its sixteenth-century Parson had been adopted. Possibly our educational history of the last three hundred years might also have been different. With what farreaching consequences to Ireland, who can tell?

PETER BYRNE, C.M.

VOL. XV-20

MODERN CHURCH BUILDING AND

FURNISHING

BY R. M. BUTLER, M.R.I.A., F.R.I.B.A.

II

CONSIDERING the several parts of a church in detail, and taking it for granted that the foundations have been well and truly laid, the first and most important items to claim attention are masonry and cut-stone. The walls of a church intended to last for centuries, it goes without saying, should be strong and massive, soundly built: they are usually too thin. The Irish climate is very exacting, and many churches are damp through thin or badly built walls. In exposed situations it is often, even with the utmost care, difficult to entirely exclude damp. Many devices to ensure against damp have been employed, including hollow walls, brick or concrete linings etc., with more or less success. It would be impossible here to consider them in detail.

Ireland possesses a variety of excellent building stones, and there are few districts in which suitable stone is not to be found within easy reach. Wherever possible, and unless some exceptionally strong reason to the contrary exists, local materials should be used. The local stone is almost certain to weather better than a stone removed from its native air, and this applies most strongly to imported stones, which seldom last in the Irish climate. It is also aesthetically more correct to use the local materials which harmonize more softly with their surroundings and do not jar on the artistic sense. In England and other countries the rural districts have their own peculiar types and forms, evolved through centuries of traditional building. A characteristic stone type is the Cotswold style. From such local traditions no sympathetic architect willingly departs, and if he is not familiar with the local building methods, he makes it his business to become so. Local tradition in building has become lost in Ireland.