XXIV. The College Green, on the south side of the cathedral, is entered through an archway under the _Edgar tower_, which tradition asserts to have been erected by Ethelred II., son of Edgar. It may possibly occupy the site of an older building, but the present tower is late work, and of little interest. In a niche on the east front is a much shattered figure of King Edgar. The rooms in the tower are now used as the chapter library, and as offices of the diocesan registry. Among the MSS. of the chapter library is one of great interest--An Epitome of Roman Law by Vacarius, an Italian who was brought to this country by Theobald, Archbishop of Canterbury, and who introduced the study of Roman or “Civil” Law at Oxford in the reign of Stephen. This is the only copy of the work of Vacarius known to exist in England, and only four copies are known on the continent--in the libraries of Konigsberg, Prague, and Bruges, and one in the possession of the Emperor of Russia[96]. The _deanery_, north-west of the cathedral, was the episcopal palace until 1842. It contains a fine hall, and some ancient portions. The east front was built by Bishop Hough in 1723. WORCESTER CATHEDRAL. PART II. History of the See, with Short Notices of the principal Bishops. Worcester was one of five episcopal dioceses into which the great Mercian province was divided during the archiepiscopate of Theodorus of Canterbury, (A.D. 668-690). Peada, son of the fierce heathen Penda of Mercia, and son-in-law of the Christian Oswi of Northumbria, had established the first Mercian see at Lichfield (see that Cathedral, Pt. II.) about the year 653. Mercia then comprised not only the whole of central England, but the greater part of Lincolnshire; and in accordance with a design expressed at the Council of Hertford, (673,) but not then carried into execution, Archbishop Theodorus divided the unwieldy diocese, which must still have contained a vast number of heathen, into five. The original see remained at LICHFIELD. The see of HEREFORD was established in 676, those of WORCESTER and LEICESTER in 680, and that of LINDISSE, or LINDSEY, in 678. The two latter, Leicester and Lindsey, were afterwards incorporated in the great diocese of Lincoln. (See that Cathedral, Pt. II.)