Inns of Court; London (England) -- Description and travel
The four fine bronze statues of Knights Templars and Knights
Hospitallers are by H. H. Armstead (1875). The Hall is rich in
portraits. Beneath a large painting of Pegasus are portraits of King
William III. and Queen Mary, of Queen Anne, George II., and Queen
Caroline. Portraits of Sir Edward Coke and Sir Thomas Lyttleton, Sir
Matthew Hale, Sir Randolph Carew, and Sir Simon Harcourt, among others,
hang upon the walls.
The old Hall of this, as of the other Inns, was frequently the scene of
Revels and Merry-making.[46] Here, as elsewhere, Christmas Feasts
formed prominent incidents in the life of the Society, and one such has
been described by Gerard Leigh (1576), when the guests were served ‘with
tender meats, sweet fruits and dainty delicates confectioned with other
curious cookery ... and at every course the Trumpeters blew the
courageous blast of deadly War, with noise of drum and fyfe; with the
sweet harmony of Violins, Sackbutts, Recorders and Cornetts, with other
instruments of music, as it seemed Apollo’s harp had tuned their stroke.
Thus the Hall was served after the most antient of the Island.’ And it
was in the old Hall of the Inner Temple that the first performance of
the first English tragedy took place in 1561. This was ‘Gorboduc; or
Ferrex and Porrex,’ and it was written by two distinguished members of
this Society: Thomas Norton and Thomas Sackville. A hundred years later
Sir Heneage Finch, afterwards Lord Chancellor and Earl of Nottingham,
‘the Oracle of Impartial Justice,’ gave in this Hall the most
magnificent ‘Reader’s Feast’ upon record.
King Charles came in his barge from Whitehall, with his Court, and was
received at the Stairs by the Reader and the Lord Chief Justice in his
scarlet robes. He passed into the Temple Garden through rows of Readers’
servants, clad in scarlet cloaks and white Tabba doubtlets, and the
Gentlemen of the Society in their gowns, whilst music and violins
sounded a welcome to His Majesty. The Duke of York was also present upon
this occasion, and so delighted was he with the entertainment that he,
together with Prince Rupert, was at once admitted to the Society, and
presently became a Bencher.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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