[38] Quarterly Review, October, 1908; Green Bag, April, 1908.
[39] Upon the seventeenth-century block, which it replaced, there used to be a sundial, which has disappeared. Perhaps its motto, ‘Vestigia nulla retrorsum,’ was deemed too generous a warning against entering upon the perilous paths of litigation.
[40] Dickens, ‘Martin Chuzzlewit.’
[41] Those of Nos. 4 and 5 are attributed to Sir Christopher Wren.
[42] His portrait, by Van Somer, hangs in the Hall.
[43] Inderwick, ‘Inner Temple Records,’ vol. ii., p. lxii.
[44] Inderwick, ‘Inner Temple Records,’ vol. i., p. xxiv. Cf. p. 48, supra.
[45] Bellot.
[46] The last occasion of a Revel taking place in the Halls of the Inns of Court was upon the elevation of Mr. Talbot to the woolsack (1734). Then, after dinner, the Benchers all assembled in the Great Hall of the Inner Temple, and a large ring having been formed round the fireplace, the Master of the Revels took the Lord Chancellor by the hand, who with his left took Mr. Justice Page, and the other serjeants and benchers being joined together, all danced about the fireplace three times, while the ancient song, ‘Round about our Coal Fire,’ accompanied by music, was sung by the Comedian, Tony Aston, dressed as a barrister. This song of the House has unfortunately been lost.
[47] Bellot, ‘Inner and Middle Temple,’ p. 49.