To the endowment in lands and taxes provided by royal order, Dr. Blair secured an appreciable addition in an ingenious manner. Learning that, some time before his arrival, the authorities had promised forgiveness to pirates who, before a set day, should confess their crimes and give up a portion of their booty, and that three famous pirates had come in after the appointed day, so that they were arrested, he visited them in jail and offered to use his influence in their behalf, if they would consent to give to the college a portion of their booty. They gladly agreed; Dr. Blair's efforts were successful, and they were given their liberty together with their treasure, minus the promised gift to the Virginia College. Another much larger gift was secured from the executor of an estate which held money devised indefinitely for "pious and charitable uses." The income from this portion of the endowment was to be used "to keep as many Indian children in meat, drink, washing, clothes, medicine, books and education, from the first beginning of letters till they should be ready to receive orders and be sent abroad to convert the Indians." In connection with the charter for "the College of William and Mary," which was dated February 8, 1693, authority was given to use the seal described as follows: "On a green field a college building of silver, with a golden sun, showing half its orb, rising above it." This is said to be the sole instance of a college, either English or American, which has a seal of such high origin. Sir Christopher Wren, the designer of St. Paul's Cathedral, made the plan for the original building, which was to be two stories and a half high, one hundred and thirty-six feet long, and forty feet wide, and with two wings sixty feet long and twenty-five feet wide. In 1697 it was reported to the governor of the province that the front and north side of the proposed rectangle had been completed at Williamsburg, and that funds were exhausted. The walls were more than three feet thick at the base, and contained 840,000 bricks, the product of a brickyard nearby. For some years subscriptions were paid slowly, and interest in the college languished, but conditions improved when King William sent to Governor Nicholson a proclamation urging him "Yt you call upon ye persons yt have promised to contribute towards ye maintenance of ye sd college, to pay in full the severall Contributions."