“Let us sit down here under the trees in King’s Bench Walk,” Godmother said, “and I’ll tell you a little about this place. You asked me just now why it was called the Temple. Did you notice the church we’ve just passed—a curious _round_-shaped church? Well, that was built more than seven hundred years ago, when Henry the Second was king, and knights from every civilized country were going to Palestine to fight in the Crusades. Some of these knights formed themselves into a society called the Templars, because they had sworn to defend the Temple of the Holy Sepulchre at Jerusalem. Well, when the English knights belonging to this great Society, or _Order_ as it was called, came home, they built that church and made it round in shape, in imitation of the Round Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem. Once upon a time these Knights Templars owned all this ground upon which the lawns and houses before us now stand.” “But I thought you said this was a place for _lawyers_?” Betty began. “So I did, and so it is now, and so it has been ever since the reign of Edward the Third. By that time, the Knights Templars were no longer the good sincere men who had formed the Society a hundred years or so before. They had become rich and proud and greedy of power, and the society was at last brought to an end. The property belonging to it went to the King, and in Edward the Third’s reign, was given to certain lawyers, and has ever since belonged to the profession of the law. But it keeps its old name of the Temple, and so recalls the time when it belonged to the great religious society of the Knights Templars.” “But none of _their_ houses or buildings are left here now?” Betty said. “Nothing except the round church which they built seven hundred years ago.” “And even the houses here now, aren’t so old as the time when the Temple first came to the lawyers, are they? They are quite different from the houses of Dick Whittington’s time, or even Elizabeth’s reign, for instance.” “Yes. That’s because all these _small_ houses were built after the Fire, which destroyed most of the Temple. Fortunately it didn’t burn the church (the oldest part of it all), nor Middle Temple Hall, which was built in Elizabeth’s reign. We’ll go and look at that Hall now, because besides being beautiful, it’s full of interesting memories.” They crossed various quiet courtyards till they came in sight of a Hall built of dark red brick and surrounded by the delicate green of trees, with lawns stretching in front of it towards the river. “That great room,” said Godmother, “has seen some wonderful sights, especially at Christmas time, when feasting and revelry went on within it. You remember the ‘masques’ of Queen Elizabeth’s day? Well, Middle Temple Hall was a favourite place for them, and the Queen herself sometimes came to see them there. You will understand in a moment what a splendid place it was for entertainments.”