I ascended into the _triforia_ by a cork-screw staircase, pausing to enter the famous Penitential Cell—a dismal hole in the wall, in which a refractory Templar was sometimes confined, but which offered him the consolations of religion, by means of a hagioscope, or slit in the masonry, through which he could see the altar of the Church, and join in the devotions of his brethren—though it may be feared he more generally responded to their chant with anything but benediction. In the _triforia_ are happily preserved all the monuments which lately disfigured the walls below: and so set are the benchers against any renewing of a bad example, that I was told they had resisted the erection of even Hooker’s bust in the choir. This I was sorry to hear, as one really felt the want of it on looking about the walls which once reflected the sounds of his earnest and persuasive voice. And what was my surprise, on my next visit, to find a workman setting it there, just as it should be! It was covered. I begged him to let me see it. ‘Honour to thy old square cap, thou venerable and judicious Richard,’ said my inmost heart, as the well-known features emerged in all their dignity; and then I asked if I was so fortunate as to be the very first to salute it. The workman, who was the sculptor himself, assured me that I was. ‘It is well,’ I answered, ‘that an American clergyman should have the privilege. We know how to value in America the great defender of Law and of Religion, and much as England owes to Hooker, America owes infinitely more, or will do so when the Church shall have proved herself, as she will in the end, the salvation of the Republic.’ Under the roof of the Middle Temple Hall, where the benchers, barristers and students still dine together, was first acted on Twelfth night, 1602, Shakspeare’s play, so called. A visit to that noble hall, and a sight of its celebrated equestrian Charles First, by Vandyck, gave me great delight. There are also several other royal portraits, and many heraldic memorials of the great historic lawyers who once “ate their terms” within its walls. The hall of the Inner Temple is less striking, but of similar character. One wonders what future Lord Chancellor sits daily at these boards, among the students. But in the Inner Temple, I thought chiefly of that gentle Templar, more gentle than its armorial Lamb, who once sat with them, the author of “the Task.”