"These two noble executors in the pursuance of the will of this testatrix, according to her desire and direction therein, presented Queen Elizabeth with a jewel, being like a star, of rubies and diamonds, with a ruby in the midst thereof, worth an hundred and forty pounds, having on the back side a hand delivering up a heart into a crown. At the delivery hereof they humbly requested of her Highness a mortmain to found a College, which she graciously granted unto them"--though the royal license did not actually come until five years later. "We usually observe infants born in the seventh month, though poor and pitiful creatures, are vital; and with great care and good attendance, in time prove proper persons. To such a _partus septimestris_ may Sidney College well be resembled, so low, lean, and little at the birth thereof. Alas! what is five thousand pounds to buy the site, build and endow a College therewith?... Yet such was the worthy care of her honourable executors, that this Benjamin College--the least and last in time, and born _after_ (as he _at_) the death of his mother--thrived in a short time to a competent strength and stature."[92] Some delay ensued, for it was not until 1593 that, at the motion of the executors, an Act of Parliament was passed enabling Trinity College to sell or let at fee farm rent the site of the Grey Friars. The College charter is dated February 14, 1596. The building was commenced in the following May, and completed, with the exception of the chapel, in 1598. In the same year the original statutes were framed by the executors. They are largely copied from those of Emmanuel, and are equally verbose, cumbrous, and ill-arranged. One clause in them which speaks of the Master as one who "_Papismum, Hæreses, superstitiones, et errores omnes ex animo abhorret et detestatur_," testifies to the intentionally Protestant character of the College, a fact, however, which did not prevent James II., on a vacancy in the mastership, intruding on the society a Papist Master, Joshua Basset, of Caius, of whom the Fellows complained that he was "let loose upon them to do what he liked." They had, however, their revenge, for, although later he was spoken of as "such a mongrel Papist, who had so many nostrums in his religion that no part of the Roman Church could own him," in 1688 he was deposed.