Of course during this long period there have been bad as well as good tutors, but I think everyone will admit that on the whole the system has worked well. Its special characteristic is a personal relation between the tutor and the pupil, materially strengthened by constant intercourse and by the fact that practically all the correspondence with the parents of the pupil passes through the hands of the tutor: experience shows that the tutorial influence has not been weakened by the fact that in most cases direct instruction is now given by other lecturers. [Footnote 17: The history of the University prior to 1546 covers some three centuries and a half, that is, about as long a period as has elapsed since 1546.] CHAPTER III. THE WESTMINSTER SCHOLARS. The relations between Trinity College and Westminster School have always been of an intimate character. Under the Elizabethan statutes of the two foundations a limited number of boys from the school were entitled, if duly qualified, to election to scholarships at Trinity, and later an attempt was made to extend the privilege to fellowships. The whole matter is now one of ancient history, but it may be interesting to put on record some of the facts connected with it. The school at Westminster owes its foundation to queen Elizabeth. Of course the abbey is many centuries older, and in a sense so is the school, for a grammar-school (in addition to the choir-school) had been attached to the medieval monastery, though doubtless it existed only at the pleasure of the monks. When Henry VIII created the diocese of Westminster with the former abbey as its cathedral, he also established a school connected with it. The diocese soon disappeared, and later the church and buildings were given by queen Mary to the Benedictines. The arrangement made by Mary was in turn annulled by Elizabeth, who, shortly after her succession founded the collegiate Church of St Peter, divided into two branches, one ecclesiastical and the other scholastic, the whole being placed under the rule of the dean and chapter. Thus Elizabeth is rightly designated as the founder of the present school, though a link with the past has been preserved in the fact that the sequence of headmasters dates by custom from 1540. The buildings were divided between the two sides of the College; for the scholastic side, one part of the monastic dormitory was made into a school-room, the granary was turned into a school dormitory, and the boys were allowed the use of the refectory for meals.